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HISTORY 



THE CRUSADES 



AGAINST 



THE ALBIGENSES. 



HISTORY 



THE CRUSADES 



THE ALBIGENSES 



THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. 



FROM THE FRENCH OF 

J. C. li. SIMONDE DE SISMONDI, 

CORRESPONDENT OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, &C, HONORARY 
MEMBER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF WILNA, «^C. 






WITH AN INTRODUCTION 



BOSTON: 

PUBLISHED BY B. B. MUSSEY, 29, CORNHILL. 

1833. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1833i 

By B. B Mussey, 
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. 



G. W, STACY, PRINTER, 



/a 



PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION. 



The American public is here presented with a por- 
tion of history which has long been a subject of interest 
and inquiry. There are few Protestant readers who 
have not, at times, looked towards the old Albigensian 
sects, those forerunners of the Reformation, with a cu- 
riosity to learn more of them and of their fortunes than 
the scantiness of our means has hitherto permitted. 
Some of the popular historians have indeed given them a 
passing notice, and have mentioned in general terms the 
persecutions they suffered ; but a clear developement of 
their character and condition,'and a regular detail of the 
horrible cruelties which ceased only with their exter- 
mination, had never been attempted by a competent au- 
thor in the English language, when the original of the 
following narrative appeared in France, nine or ten years 
ago. It is from the pen of a well known scholar and 
elegant writer, the celebrated M. de Sismondi, and forms 
a sort of episode in his great work, Histoire des Fran- 
gais,* which has reached to the sixteenth or seventeenth 
volume, without being yet completed. Though but a 
part, however, of this larger work, the present section 
appears entire in itself, and sufficiently independent of 

* Chap, xxiv et eeq. Tomes vi, vii . 



VI PREFACE. 

the general history to be read with advantage in this 
separate form. 

Its scene lies chiefly in that beautiful country, the 
South of France, extending around the mouths of the 
Rhone, westward to the city of Toulouse, and south- 
ward to the Pyrenees, comprising the old governments 
of Provence, Avignon and Languedoc. The period of 
which it treats begins with the early part of the thir- 
teenth century, when the first crusade against the Pro- 
ve^nals was attempted, and runs onward through nearly 
forty years of succeeding carnage and desolation. At 
the beginning of the period, this ill-fated region appears 
a bright and sunny spot, like Goshen of old, while dark- 
ness lay around on all the face of the land ; at its con- 
clusion, to use the words of the English translator, ' it 
seems as if the night of ignorance and tyranny had clos- 
ed upon the nations forever.' Nor was it till three cen- 
turies afterwards, if we except the appearance of Wick- 
liffe and Huss, that the Reformation again dawned upon 
Europe and effectually dissipated the shades which had 
enveloped the world for ages. 

The following translation of the history was published 
anonymously at London in 1826 ; and from that edition 
the work of M. de Sisraondi is here reprinted verbatim, 
with the correction however of two or three typographi- 
cal errors. But in the appendages, some alterations 
have been made, of which it is proper to give notice. 
The long Introductory Essay by the translator, consist- 
ing for the most part of reflections against the Catholic 
church, is omitted, because it would be read with little 
interest in this country, though the state of parties in 
Great Britain miffht there ensure it attention. The 



PREFACE. VU 

historical extract from Venema, however, is retained and 
placed as an Appendix. And since M. de Sismondi has 
not, in the present narrative, traced the previous fortunes 
of the Albigensian sects, nor pointed out their origin, an 
attempt is made to supply these deficiences by a new In- 
troduction. A Table of Contents, also, is furnished for 
the work. These alterations and additions, if well ex- 
ecuted, cannot fail to enhance the value of the publi- 
cation. 

Boston, January 1833. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Intkoduction. .,.,.... 17 
-HISTORY OP THE CRUSADE, &c. 



CHAPTER K 



A.D. PAGE 

1200. Political divisions of France . ^ . . 28 
Relations of the Southern Provinees with the king 
ofAragon 29 

Character of the Prov en9als in Languedoc, Provence 
and Catalonia ...... 30 

Their advance in knowledge the occasion of their 
persecution '. . . . . . . SI 

Religious sentiments, zeal and wide diffusion of the 
Albigensian sects 33 

Pope Innocent III, undertakes their extirmination. 37 
Origin of the Inquisition ..... 38 
1204. The Pope's commissaries seek a quarrel with Ray- 
mond VI, count of Toulouse, and excommunicate 
him ...:..., 41 



CONTENTS. IX 

A.D. PAGE 

1207. The Pope orders a Crusade to be preached against 

the Albigenses 44 

1208. His legate murdered by a follower of Raymond VI 45 

The Pope's bull against the count ... 46 

Indulgences granted to the crusaders ... 47 

Zeal of the Citeaux and Bernardin monks. Institu- 
tion of the order of St. Dominic, or of Inquisitors 49 

Raymond VI, and Raymond Roger, being refused a 
hearing by the chiefs of the Crusade, the former is 
terrified into submission, the latter prepares for de-' 
fence 50 

The former cajoled by the Pope .... 52 

1209. The hordes of Crusaders begin to move towards Lang- 

uedoc, under Arnold the Pope's legate . . 53 

Raymond VI, having done penance, is suffered to join 
them 55 

They attack the states of Raymond Roger . . 56 

Take Beziers, and massacre the entire population 58 

Besiege Raymond Roger in Carcassonne . . 62 

Ineffectual mediation of Peter II of Aragon . . 62 

Raymond Roger taken prisoner^ through the perfidy 

of the Pope's legate 65 

Carcasonne taken ; wonderful escape of the citizens 65 
The avowed object of the Crusade accomplished; Ijut 

the legate Arnold aims at a more thorough extermi- 



Asserables a Council of the Crusaders, and bestows 
the cont|uered provinces on the monster Simon de 
JMontfort , , 



67 



X CONTENTS. 

A.D. PAGE 

who completes the subjugation, while the Crusaders 
return liome . 70 

He perfidiously orders the secret murder of Raymond 
Roger 72 



CHAPTER II. 
A.D. PAGE 

1209. Desolation of the conquered provinces . . .' 73 
Extermination of heretics, regarded as a sacred duty 74 
Zeal for the persecution of the Albigenses rages 

throughout Europe 75 

The monks of Citeaux take the lead ... 76 
Montfort emboldened by reinforcements to declare 

war against Raymond VI, but his subjects revolt 77 

Raymond seeks the protection of the Pope; who tem- 
porizes with him ...... 79 

1210. The legate Arnold procures his excommunication in 

the council of St. Gilles 81 

Crusade preached anew 83 

Montfort, with a new army, takes several of Ray- 
mond's castles 84 

Perfidy of the Crusaders and constancy of the here- 
tics at the castle of Minerva .... 84 

Massacre at the castle of Termes, and ravage of the 
territory 88 

1211. Montfort's machinations against Raymond . . 89 
Beguiles him to the council of Aries, which excom- 
municates him anew ..... 91 

Fouquet, the ferocious bishop of Toulouse . . 93 
Montfort takes several castles, and besieges La- 
vaur • 93 



CONTENTS. XI 

A.D. PACK 

Raymond takes arms in self-defence . . . - 95 

Capture of Lavaur, and massacre there . : 96 

Open war between Raymond and Montfort . . 98 
who besieges Toulouse, Raymond's capital ; but is 

forced to retire ...... 99 

Raymond's successes 101 

1212. Change of the secular clergy of the province ; usur- 

pations of the legate Arnold . • . . 102 

His attention diverted to the Crusade against the 

Moors in Spain . . . • » • • 104 

A new Crusade against the Albigenses preached by 

the monks of Citeaux 106 

Outrages of the army thus gathered under Montfort 107 

He assembles a Parliament at Pamiers . . 108 

1213. Pedro II of Aragon procures for Raymond the protec- 

tion of the Pope, 109 

and that of the king of France .... 112 
Montfort and the council of Lavaur bring over the 

Pope again to their side 113 

The king of Aragon sides with Raymond, besieges 

Muret, and is slain in battle against Montfort . 115 



CHAPTER III. 



A.D. PAGE 

1213. Rapacity of Montfort restrained by the Pope and 

neighboring sovereigns 121 

1214. Peter, the new legate, procures the submission of the 

lords of Languedoc 122 

Fresh hordes of Crusaders advance, and glean a few 
victims 123' 



XU CONTENTS. 

A.D. PAGE 
Montfort strengthens his cause by forming new con- 
nexions 124 

1215. Montpellier places itself under the protection of the 

king of France . . . ; . . 125 

but the council assembled there confers the whole 
province on Montfort 127 

A new body of Crusaders approach under prince 
Louis of France 128 

The legate's and Montfort's groundless jealousy of 
him 130 

The fourth General Council of Lateran meets ; pro- 
hibits the preaching of Crusades against the Albi- 
genses .... .... 130 

but grants the conquered provinces to Montfort . 131 

The Albigensian sects apparently extinct . . 132 

1216. Quarrel between Montfort and Arnold on the divis- 

ion of their conquests ..... 135 

The people's aversion to Montfort . . . 136 
Raymond and his son established over part of Prov- 
ence; raise an army ofProven9als and Aragonese 
to regain their ancient possessions . . . 137 

Received by the city of Beaucaire, and favored by 
Toulouse 138 

The perfidy of the' bishop of Toulouse introduces 
Montfort into this city 1 39 

1217. His oppressions and cruelties in the province . 142 
Raymond recalled to Toulouse, and received with joy 

throughout the country 143 

His success inspires his friends with courage . 146 

Montfort marches to besiege him in Toulouse . 147 

121S. but is killed before the walls . . . .150 



CONTENTS. Xlll 

A.D. PAGE. 

Ills son, Amaury de Montfort, forced to raise the 
siege 150 



CHAPTER IV. 



A.D. page; 

1218. Failure of the original historians to continue the 

narrative . 151 

The fifth Crusade against the Mussulmans affords a 
respite to the South of France . . . 152 

1219. The new Pope, Honorius III, patronizes Amaury de 

Montfort ; and prince Louis of France joins him 

with his followers ...... 154 

Raymond transfers the cares of his government to 

his son Raymond VII 155 

The Crusaders take the castle of Marmande, and 

perfidiously murder the inhabitants . . . 156 

Besiege Toulouse ; but are forced to retire . . 157 

1220. Successes of Raymond VII .... 159 

1221. The Pope institutes a new order of knights for the 

detection of heretics 161 

1222. Instigates the king and bishops of France against 

the Albigenses, many of whom had returned to 
Languedoc ....... 162 

Amaury de Montfort despairs of retaining his prov- 
inces ... 163 

~ Death of Raymond VI ..... 165 

1223. Encouraging prospects of his son . . . 166 
Conrad, the new legate, convokes the council of 

Sens against the reviving Albigenses . . 168 

Attempts to engage the king of France against 

them 169 

Death of Philip Augustus, and acceesion of his soh 



XIV CONTENTS. 

A.D. PAGE. 

Louis to the throne of France .... 170 

1224. Amaury de Montfort driven out of his provinces . 175 
Louis prepares an expedition against Raymond VII, 177 
which is prevented by the project of a Crusade to 

Palestine 179 

Raymond negociates with the court of Rome . 1S2 
War between England and France affords another 

respite to the Languedocians .... 184 

1225. The Pope instigates a new expedition against them 187 
Unconditional, but unavailing submission of Ray- 
mond 188 

Albigenses in Italy . . . . . ; 190 

Peace between France and England . . . 191 
Council of Bourges refuses Raymond's submission, 

and grants his states to Louis, . . . 193 

who raises a large army to take possession. . . 196 

1226. The Pope forbids the neighbouring Sovereigns to aid 

Raymond . 199 

Louis marches to Lyons, and receives the submission 

of the southern barons . . . . .201 
Takes Avignon and other cities .... 202 
Discovers and burns one heretic .... 211 
Returns towards Paris, and dies on the way . 211 



CHAPTER V. 



A.D. PAGE* 

1226. State of the French monarchy. Queen Blanche . 213 

1227. The affairs of Raymond and his provinces, unsettled 215 
Blanche continues the war .... 217 



CONTENTS. XV 
A.D. PAGE. 

Tlie Albigensian heretics extinct in Languedoc . 218 

Reformation in the theological schools of Paris . 219 

1228. Raymond takes the field 221 

A new horde of Crusaders ravage the territory of 

Toulouse 222 

Compel Raymond to negociate .... 223 

1229. His abject submission 224 

Permanent establishment of the Inquisition by the 

council of Toulouse ..... 228 

The rules prescribed for its proceedings . . 229 

Its immediate operations ..... 236 

Origin of the University of Toulouse . . . 238 

Death of Fouquet,the ferocious bishop of Toulouse 239 
Raymond's situation ameliorated, but the oppression 

of the people continued ..... 240 
1231. The Albigensian sects, suppressed in their own 

country, are scattered over Europe . . . 243 

Proceedings of Pope Gregory IX against them . 244 

Raymond persuaded to aid in persecuting them . 246 

1233. Death of St. Dominic 249 

The Inquisition extended with great vigilance through 

the South of France 250 

Raymond, accused of remissness in persecuting, prom- 
ises his utmost exertions .... 251 

1234. The Albigensian sects make fresh progress . . 253 

1235. Instructions of the council of Narbonne to the Inquisi- 

tors 254 

1236. State of the South of France . . . .256 
Spirit of resistance against the Inquisitors . . 260 

1239. Raymond attempts to recover part of his hereditary 



XVI CONTENTS. 

A.D. ~ PAGE 

domains 264 

1240, Besieges Aries, but forced to retire . . . 264 
Trencavel, son of the murdered Raymond Roger, 

takes arms to regain his heritage; . . . 266 

but is made prisoner 267 

1241, Raymond VII submits again to the king of France, 26S 

1242, makes another attempt to free himself and coun- 

try 269 

and is again reduced to unconditional submission. 270 



Appendix 273 



INTRODUCTION. 



ORIGIN AND EARLY HISTORY OF THE ALBIGENSIAN SECTS. 



It was after a long period of undisturbed repose, 
that the Roman CathoHc Church began to awake, 
between the years 1000 and 1050, to the discov- 
ery of a new race of heretics who had appeared 
within her borders. At first they were few, easi- 
ly exterminated, and occasioned little or no dis- 
quietude in the great and overwhelming mass of 
their persecutors. But before the close of the 
century, their number was manifestly growing 
troublesome, and during the next century, alarm- 
ing. As early at least as A. D. 1150, they had 
spread, under different names, through most of the 
southern countries of Europe ; and the sudden- 
ness with which they sprung up, their simultaneous 
appearance in distant parts, gave them the impos- 
ing air of mystery and magnified their power and 
resources in the pubhc estimation. It seemed as 
if there lay throughout the continent some prolific 
cause concealed among the laboring classes, giving 
constant birth to heresy in every quarter, and 
multiplying new sects with a profusion that baffled 
all attempts at their extermination. Suppressed 
in one place, they arose in another ; and the very 
scenes of their destruction frequently witnessed 
their speedy reappearance. 

These were the sects soon afterwards known by 
1 



18 INTRODUCTION. 

a common appellation, that of Albigenses. Though 
classed together by later writers under this one 
name, they nevertheless differed much in their 
respective doctrines and manners. Little rehg- 
ious intercourse or sympathy existed between 
them, many of them were united by no bond of 
fellowship, and some, it is said, mutually denoun- 
ced each other. But all were alike noted for 
their opposition to the established church and to 
the vices of the monks and clergy ; nor were 
they less equally distinguished for their enthusi- 
asm, their constancy in sufferings, and the zeal 
with which they laboured to propagate their sen- 
timents among the Catholics. 

Their origin, though involved in some obscu- 
rity, may be traced with sufficient clearness to a 
cooperation of causes, of which the following 
were the principal : 1 . The abuses of the church 
had reached that extreme point wiiere reaction 
begins. The general licentiousness of the clergy 
had destroyed the respect which their sacred 
office naturally commanded ; their insatiable cu- 
pidity and boundless arrogance had roused pop- 
ular indignation. The people were thus prepared 
to doubt the spiritual infallibility of their leaders, 
and to question their instructions. Indeed, there 
were some, especially among the vallies on the 
Italian side of the Alps, who had already gone 
so far as to discard the authority and many of 
the corruptions of Rome ; and nothing but a for- 
tunate impulse was wanting to call forth a univer- 
sal spirit of religious inquiry. 2. At this crisis, 
a sect of Gnostic christians, who had originally 
borne the name of Paulicians, began to immigrate 
in successive swarms from, the East, and soon 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

diffused themselves over the southern and western 
parts of Europe, awakening in their progress 
the dormant spirit of reform. They brought with 
them indeed many errors of foreign, of Asiatic 
origin ; but as a requital, they also brought, wher- 
ever they came, an antidote to the peculiar cormp- 
tions of the Catholic church. These they expos- 
ed with unwearied and successful zeal. And if 
we may judge from the meagre accounts of their 
arguments and controversies, they had in common 
use several of the books of sacred Scripture, 
which had long disappeared among the laity of the 
West. Their influence was followed by the rise 
and multiplication of the sects to which we have 
alluded ; and asthe first leaders in this extensive 
and interesting movement, they are worthy to be 
traced back through the scenes of their prev- 
ious history. This we shall now briefly narrate. 

The Paulicians were at once descendants and 
dissenters from the ancient Manicheans, with 
whose Gnosticism they were somewhat tainted, 
though they rejected the appellation with the 
utmost vehemence. About the year 660, we 
first discover this people in considerable num- 
bers spreading quietly from the neighborhood of 
Samosata in the upper region of the Euphrates, 
northeastwardly through Armenia, and northward- 
ly through Cappadocia and Pontus. Descended 
from the Gnostics, who had never been affected 
with any of the gradual and at length enormous 
corruptions of the Catholics, they abhorred the 
worship of saints, the use of relics, of images, 
pompous ceremonies and ecclesiastical domina- 
tion ; and in their extreme simplicity they dispeix* 



20 . INTRODUCTION. 

sed even with the rites of water baptism and of 
the Lord's supper. Their preachers were distin- 
guished by no title from their brethren at large ; 
and among themselves no superiority was recog- 
nized, save what arose from the austerity of their 
lives, their zeal or their knowledge. The Jewish 
books, as they called the Old Testament, they re- 
jected ; but the New Testament they received 
as the inestimable and only volume of sacred Scrip- 
ture, and enjoined its diligent perusal on all the 
people. It is probable, however, that they dis- 
owned the two Epistles of St.Peter and the 
Revelation of St. John ; and it is certain that 
their favorite books were the writings of St. Paul, 
from whom, perhaps, they took the name Pauli- 
cians. Still they held the Gnostic doctrines, that 
all matter is intrinsecally depraved and the source 
of all moral evil ; that it was by a secondary and 
degenerate Being that the visible world was 
formed ; that it was by him also that the Mosaic 
dispensation was given, and the Old Testament 
inspired ; that the body with which Christ was 
seen upon earth, together with his crucifixion, 
was apparent only ; and we may conclude that 
they of course denied his corporeal resurrection, 
and that of mankind. 

These Gnostic errors must have rendered them 
odious to the church ; but it was the thorough 
simplicity of their institutions, their disrespect for 
saints, their contempt of relics and images, and 
their vehement reprehension of the ecclesiastical 
frauds and superstitions, which stung their adver- 
saries into wrath, and kindled against them the 
most implacable hatred. The orthodox sover- 
eigns of the eastern empire entered heartily into 



INTRODUCTION. 21 

the feelings of the church, and resolved on their 
complete extermination. For an hundred and 
fifty years they endured a series of bloody perse- 
cutions with a patience and inoffensive meekness 
that even converted some of their executioners. 
But in one of their short intervals of repose, about 
the year 750 or 760, the reigning emperor of the 
East transported a large colony of them from Asia 
to Thrace on the European side of the Bospho- 
rus. Here their sufferings, though at first by no 
means suspended, were mitigated, while the storm 
increased upon their brethren in Asia, until it 
spent itself, about a century afterwards, in an 
almost universal carnage. We are, however, 
concerned only with the affairs of the European 
exiles, and to them we shall confine our attention. 
With a zeal which no hardships could repress, 
they diffused their doctrines in Thrace, and con- 
verted their northern neighbors, the Bulgarians 
and Sclavonians, in the lower region of the Dan- 
ube. Two hundred years after their transporta- 
tion, they were reinforced, about A.D. 970, by 
another large colony brought over from Armenia. 
They now enjoyed a full toleration of their faith 
and some degree of power. In Thrace they 
were predominant ; they occupied the important 
city of Philipoppolis, two hundred and twenty 
miles northwest of Constantinople ; and they soon 
afterwards extended a line of villages and castles 
westwardly through Macedonia and Epirus. But 
it was in Bulgaria that the chief seat of their 
church was established, and their affairs the most 
prosperous ; and here, it would seem, their insti- 
tutions underwent some change that betrayed the 



22 INTRODUCTION. 

rise of ambition with their growing power : they 
violated their original principle of perfect equality 
and freedom, and appointed a supreme bishop who 
exercised authority over their sect wherever scat- 
tered abroad. 

From these countries they began to spread, by 
the various chances of trade, of war and of perse- 
cution, as well as by their missionary enterprize, 
into other parts of Europe. Their first migra- 
tions, it is said, were to Sicily, Lombardy, Lig- 
uria and Milan, probably about A.D. 1000 ; and 
hence they sent their teachers over the Alps or 
across the Mediterranean into France. Succes- 
sive bodies followed from Bulgaria, and were si- 
lently dispersed through the continent. Their 
Manichean or oriental notions would have been, 
perhaps, an absolute preventive to the reception 
of their faith by the people of the West, were it 
not for the counteracting influence of peculiar cir- 
cumstances. We have already observed that a 
general discontent had been provoked by the 
avarice, the despotism, the mummery and the 
dissoluteness of the Church of Rome ; and when 
the neglected and abused populace beheld a sect 
of professed christians enthusiastic in their reli- 
gion, blameless in their lives, humble in their de- 
meanor, and disclaiming all tyranny over the 
consciences of men, the spectacle was to many so 
engaging that they became their converts to a 
greater or less extent, and adopted their new 
doctrines, though with various modifications ac- 
cording to the different temper of the hearers. 
The result was, that numerous sects sprung into 
being from the impulse which the Paulicians 



INTRODUCTION. 23 

gave to religious inquiry. Some would naturally 
receive their opinions implicitly ; others, only in 
part; some would carefully reject their Manichean 
principles, and embrace merely their simple insti- 
tutions and their system of molality ; others again 
would be most captivated with the absurdest 
parts of their scheme, and carry them to still 
greater lengths of fanaticism ; and some, having 
their attention once aroused, would pursue an 
original and independent course of thought. So 
various was the character of the heresies, thus 
called, which broke out in all the southern coun- 
tries of Europe during the eleventh and twelfth 
centuries ; but diverse as they were, they all 
agreed in the single aim of exposing the corrup- 
tions and arrogance of the established church. 
Meanwhile, it must be remembered, the ven- 
geance of Rome hung over the heads of all dis- 
senters ; and both the foreign immigrants and the 
native converts were compelled to observe the 
most profound secrecy in the enjoyment of their 
faith, as w^ell as to practice the most cautious arts 
in the propagation of their sentiments. Renun- 
ciation or death was the penalty of disclosure or 
detection. 

The first discovery of a congregation of this 
kind within the borders of the church, was in 
A.D. 1017, at Orleans in France. The heresy 
had been lately introduced from Italy ; and sev- 
eral of the regular clergy and many respectable 
citizens were its adherents. A council was im- 
mediately convened, and after laboring in vain 
to reclaim the believers, they were all burnt alive. 
Other advocates of the doctrine, however, were 



24 INTRODUCTION. 

discovered, not far from the same time, in Lan- 
guedoc, the famous scene of its future prevalence. 
In 1030, it was found that the heresy had been 
received from Italy among an illiterate class in 
the north of France, near the Netherlands ; but 
its followers were persuaded to return to the 
church, in a council held at Arras. In the lat- 
ter part of this century, they were discovered in 
Suabia, whence they spread through Germany, 
under the name of Cathari, or The Pure. They 
prevailed in Italy, especially on the Alpine front- 
iers, where they were called Paterins. In what- 
ever countries they lurked, the watchful eye of 
the clergy sought them out, and the tender mercy 
of the church, who refused to stain her hands 
with blood, delivered them over to the civil au- 
thorities to be persecuted and put to death at her 
instigation. The doctrines of most of them par- 
took more or less of the Gnostic principles, such 
as the inherent depravity of all matter, the duty 
of rigid abstinence for the purpose of mortifying 
the body, and the impropriety of the union of the 
sexes even by marriage. A few placed religion 
exclusively in the internal contemplation of di- 
vine subjects, discarding all outward ordinances ; 
others admitted certain rites and ceremonies. 
Some rejected the Old Testament, while others 
received all the canonical books of Scripture, 
which many of them interpreted allegorically. 
Some explained away the doctrine of a corpore- 
al resurrection, some denied a future judg- 
ment and retribution. On these points, however, 
there was a difference of opinion, as likewise on 
that of the trinity. But all were unanimous in 



INTRODUCTION. 25 

contemning the mystery of transubstantiation, 
and in exposing the idolatry of the Church of 
Rome and the wickedness of her officers. 

From the year 1100, their increase was such 
as to cause some alarm among the ecclesiastical 
guardians. In the early part of the century, Pe- 
ter de Bruys, a presbyter, established a sect of 
more intelligent reformers in Languedoc and 
Provence ; and after twenty years' labor, suffered 
death at the hands of the enraged populace. In 
A.D. 1119, a council was held at Toulouse 
against the heretics ; and they were condemned 
ao^ain in the ore at Lateran council at Rome in 
1139. In 1160, they crossed in great numbers 
from Gascony into England, where they were 
called Pophlicians and Publicans, corruptions of 
the original name, Paulicians. In France they 
were denominated Bougres or Bulgarians, Los 
Bos Homos or Good Men, and Weavers, from 
their occupation. In Germany, they still retain- 
ed the name of Cathari, which was extended, 
together with that of Paterins, to those in Italy. 
Here they were divided in two parties : those 
who held two First Causes, the God of light, and 
the Prince of darkness ; and those on the other 
hand who maintained One Supreme, from whom 
all things proceeded. It was to the latter party 
that the heretics in Languedoc belonged, and 
tliose likewise who abounded in the neighboring 
provinces of Spain. Amidst the agitations of 
this period, a new sect arose, which is venerated 
by the Protestants and respected even by the 
Cathohcs : The Waldenses began to appear in 
the South of France, about A.D. 1160 \ and by 



26 INTRODUCTION. 

the enterprize of their founder, Peter Waldus, 
they extended, within half a century, over most 
of the civihzed countries of Europe. They were 
often confounded with the sects of Pauhcian ori- 
gin, though it is probable that with these they held 
but little connexion, and were indebted to them 
for nothing, except the first impulse of their 
movement. At this time, the valhes among the 
Alps, and the plains of Piedmont, seem to have 
been filled with heretics ; but their mountain bar- 
riers concealed them from observation, and secur- 
ed them from ready approach. The beautiful 
country in the South of France was better known 
and more highly regarded, for its delightful situa- 
tion and the distinguished refinement of the in- 
habitants. And as it had long abounded with the 
obnoxious sects, it was here that the seat of their 
wide spread heresy was supposed to be placed. 
A council was convened against them, in 1165, 
at Lombers in this region, and another at Tou- 
louse in 1176. Two years afterwards, the kings 
of England and France sent the Cardinal Le- 
gate, several archbishops and bishops, together 
with some of the other clergy, to convert the her- 
etics of Toulouse, or to excommunicate them, 
and order the lords of the province to destroy 
them from the country. The deputation, how- 
ever, effected but Httle. In the Lateran council 
of the next year, 1179, Pope Alexander III 
published an edict against ' the heretics in Gas- 
cony, in Albigeois, in the territory of Toulouse 
and in other places, who are called Cathari, 
Paterins, Publicans,' he. ' Since their accursed 
perverseness,' adds he, ' has risen to the height 



INTRODUCTION. 27 

that they no longer practise their iniquity, hke 
others, in secret, but proclaim their error openly, 
alluring the simple and weak, — we hereby de- 
clare them, and all who defend or receive them 
excommunicated ; and we forbid all, under pen- 
alty of excommunication, to admit them into their 
houses or on their premises, or to hold any deal- 
ings with them. And if they die in this their 
sin, none shall pray for them, nor give them 
christian burial, on any pretence or occasion 
whatsoever.' From this time till the end of the 
century, when the following History begins, the 
heretics were repeatedly anathematized by the 
councils, put to death in different places, and 
sometimes besieged in their strong holds by troops 
raised for that purpose. We have only to add, 
that it was in this period they first received the 
name of Albigenses, from the territory of Albigea, 
near Toulouse, where they abounded ; and that 
the appellation afterwards comprehended all the 
different sects of this kind which were scattered 
through the countries of Europe. [Gibbon^ s 
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chap. 
liv. — Mosheim's Institutes of Ecclesiastical His- 
tory, (Murdochs Translatio7i,) Cent. ix. Pt. ii. 
ch. V. Cent. x. Pt. ii. ch.v.Cent.xi. Pt. ii.ch.v. 
Cent. xii. Pt. ii. ch. v. — Bossuet, Histoire des 
Variations, Liv. xi. <§> 1. — 184. — Schrbc'kKs 
Christliche Kirchengeschichte, Th. xxix. S. 
476 — 645. — Sismondi's Historical View of the 
Literature of the South of Europe, Chap, iii — ■ 
vi.] 



HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES 



THE ALBIGENSES. 



CHAPTER I. 



[From A.D. 1207, to A.D. 1209.] 



France, during the feudal period, instead of 
forming an entire monarchy, was submitted to the 
influence of four kings ; to each of whom a number 
of grand vassals were subordinate : so that the 
North of France might be considered as Walloon, 
a name afterwards confined to the French Flem- 
ings, and which was then given to the language 
spoken by Philip Augustus ; towards the West 
was an English France ; to the East, a German 
France ; and in the South, a Spanish or Aragon- 
ese France. Till the reign of Phihp Augustus, 
the first division possessed the least of extent, of 
riches, or of power. That monarch, by a con- 
course of fortunate circumstances rather than by 
his talents, greatly exalted the splendour of his 
crown, and extended his dominion over a part of 
France much more important than his own inher- 
itance. At the beginning, of the thirteenth cen- 
tury, the division which has been indicated did, 



A.D. 2100.] THE ALBIGENSES. 29 

however, still exist. He had conquered more 
than half of the English France, but Aquitaine 
still belonged to England. The Germanic 
France had still the same limits ; except that, of 
the three kingdoms of which it was composed, 
those of Lorraine and Burgundy had more inti- 
mately than formerly united themselves with th€ 
Empire, so that their history was no longer min- 
gled with that of France. On the contrary, the 
kingdom of Provence had so much relaxed its 
connexion with the imperial crown, that its great 
vassals might be considered absolutely indepen- 
dent, and the most powerful of its states, the 
countship of Provence, possessed by the King of 
Aragon, might be justly denominated the Ara- 
gonese France. 

The king of Aragon might, as well as the king 
of England, be considered a French Prince. The 
greater part of his states, even beyond the Py- 
renees and as far as the Ebro, were considered 
to belong to the ancient monarchy of Charfe- 
magne, and owed homage to the crown of France. 
Like the king of England, the king of Aragon 
had acquired, either by marriages, or by grants of 
fief, or by treaties of protection, dominion over a 
great number of French lords ; some of whom 
did homage to the king of France, others to the 
emperor ; but all of whom, nevertheless, rendered 
obedience only to the Spanish monarch. The 
Counts of Beam, of Armagnac, of Bigorre, of 
Cominges, of Foix, and of Roussillon, lived un- 
der his protection, and served in his armies. 
The viscounts of Narbonne, of Beziers, and of 
Carcassonne, regarded him as their count. The 



30 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1200. 

lord of Montpellier had submitted to him. The 
powerful count of Toulouse, surrounded by his 
states and vassals, maintained with difficulty, his 
own independence against him. The countships 
of Provence and of Forcalquier belonged solely 
to him, whilst the other vassals of the kingdom of 
Aries were eager to obtain his protection. 

Languedoc, Provence, Catalonia, and all the 
surrounding countries which depended on the 
king of Aragon, were peopled by an industrious 
and intelligent race of men, addicted to com- 
merce and the arts, and still more to poetry. 
They had formed the provencal language ; 
which, separating itself from the Walloon Ro- 
man, or French, was distinguished by more har- 
monious inflexions, by a richer vocabulary, by 
expressions more picturesque, and by greater 
flexibility. This language, studied by all the 
genius of the age, consecrated to the innumerable 
songs of war and of love, appeared at that mo-^ 
ment destined to become the first and the most 
elegant of the languages of modern Europe. 
Those who used it had renounced the name of 
Frenchmen for that of Provencals ; they had en- 
deavored, by means of their language, to form 
themselves into a nation, and to separate them- 
selves absolutely from the French, to whom they 
were indeed inferior m the arts of war, but whom 
they greatly excelled in all the attainments of civ- 
ilization. 

The numerous courts of the small princes 
amongst whom these countries were divided, aspir- 
ed to be models of taste and pohteness. They 
lived in festivity ; their chief occupation was. 



A.D. 1200.] THE ALBIGENSES. 31 

tournaments, courts of love, and of poesy, in 
which questions of gallantry were gravely deci- 
ded. The cities were numerous and flourishing. 
Their forms of government were all nearly re- 
publican ; they had consuls chosen by the peo- 
ple, and had long possessed the privilege of 
forming communes, which rendered them nearly 
equal to the Italian republics with whom they 
traded. 

In the midst of such growing prosperity was 
this lovely region delivered to the fury of count- 
less hordes of fanatics, its cities ruined, its popu- 
lation consumed by the sword, its commerce des- 
troyed, its arts thrown back into barbarism, and 
its dialect degraded, from the rank of a poetic 
language, to the condition of a vulgar jargon. 
This horrible revolution was not, in its com- 
mencement, directed by the French government; 
but some of its consequences were, that the Pro 
ven^als ceased to be a nation, — that the influence 
of the King of Aragon over a large part of the 
South of France was destroyed, — and that the 
power of the kings of France was, at last, extend- 
ed to the Mediterranean Sea. 

The preaching of a first religious reformation 
amongst the provencals was the occasion of the 
devastation of this beautiful country. Too eady 
enlightened, proceeding too rapidly in the career 
of civihzation, these people excited the jealousy 
and hatred of the surrounding barbarians. A 
struggle began between the lovers of darkness 
and those of light, between the advocates of des- 
potism and those of liberty. The party that 
wished to arrest the progress of the human mind 



32 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1200. 

had on its side the pernicious skill of its chiefs, 
the fanaticism of its agents, and the number of its 
soldiers. It triumphed : it annihilated its adver- 
saries ; and with such fury did it profit by its vic- 
tory, that the conquered party was never able to 
rise again in the same province; or amongst the 
same race of men. 

In the countries which used the Provencal 
tongue the clergy had been 'enriched by immense 
dotations ; but the bishoprics were generally re- 
served for members of powerful families, who led 
disorderly lives, whilst the curates and inferior 
priests, taken from the vassals of the nobihty, 
their peasants and slaves, retained the brutality, 
the ignorance, and the baseness, of their servile 
origin. The people of these provinces were too 
enlightened not to feel contempt for the vices of 
the ecclesiastics ; and so general was this con- 
tempt, that expressions the most offensive to 
churchmen were become proverbial. I would 
rather he a priest, said they by imprecation, than 
have done such a thing /* Nevertheless, the 
disposition of the people was towards religion ; 
and that devotion which they could not find in the 
church, they sought for amongst the sectaries. 
These were numerous in the province ; and the 
most ancient historian of the persecution affirms, 
that Toulouse, whose name, says he, ought rath- 
er to have been Tot a dolosa, had been scarcely 
ever exempt, even from its first foundation, from 

* Prologus Chronicl de Pedio Laurentii, p. 666. In Duchesne 
Script. Franc, torn. v. Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, eh. ii, 
p. 129. 



A.D. 1200.] THE ALBIGENSES. 33 

that pest of heresy which the fathers transmitted 
to their children. * 

Those very persons who punished the secta- 
ries with frightful torments have alone taken upon 
themselves to make us acquainted whh their 
opinions ; allowing, at the same time, that they 
had been transmitted in Gaul from generation to 
generation, almost from the origin of Christianity. 
We cannot, therefore, be astonished if they have 
represented them to us with all those characters 
which might render them the most monstrous, 
mingled with all the fables which would serve to 
irritate the minds of the people against those who 
professed them. Nevertheless, amidst many 
puerile or calumnious tales, it is still easy to re- 
cognize the principles of the reformation of the 
sixteenth century amongst the heretics who are 
designated by the name of Vaudois, or Albigeois 
Numerous sects existed at the same time in 
the province ; and this was the necessary conse- 
quence of the liberty of inquiry which formed 
the essence of their doctrine : all agreed, howev- 
er, in regarding the church of Rome as having 
absolutely perverted Christianity, and in main- 
taining that it was she who was designated in the 
Apocalypse by the name of the whore of Baby- 
lon. Some, however, who were distinguished 
by the name of Vaudois, or Waldenses, did not 
differ from her on the points which are the most 
important, whilst others had given such licence to 

* Petri ValHs Cernai Hist. Albigens. cap-t 1. apud Duchesne 
Script. Franc, torn. v. 555. Le meme ; editio Trecensis 1615, 
8vo. 



34 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1200. 

their imaginations as almost to destroy the entire 
system of Revelation. They attributed the Old 
Testament to the principle of evil ; for God was 
there represented, they said, as a homicide, who 
destroyed the human race by a deluge, Sodom and 
Gomorrah by fire, and the Egyptians by the in- 
undation of the Red Sea. * 

But, with respect to those who opened the ca- 
reer to the reformers of the sixteenth century, 
we recognize their teaching by their denial of the 
real presence in the eucharist. ' If the body of 
Christ,' said they, * was as large as our moun- 
tains, it must have been destroyed by the num- 
ber of those whom they pretend to have eaten of 
it.' They rejected the sacraments of confirma- 
tion, of confession, and marriage, as vain and 
frivolous ; they charged with idolatry the expo- 
sure of images in the churches ; and they named 
the bells, which summoned the people to the ad- 
oration of these images, trumpets of demons. 
Their teachers or priests were contented with a 
black coat, instead of the pompous vestments of 
the catholic clergy. After they had caused 
their proselytes to abjure idolatry, they received 
then>into their church by the imposition of hands 
and the kiss of peace. Whilst their enemies en- 
devoured to blacken their reputation by charging 
them with permitting, in their teaching, the most 
licentious manners, anfl with practising, in secret, 
all kinds of disorders, they still allowed that, in 
appearance, they observed an irreproachable 
chastity ; that, in their abstinence from all ani- 

♦Hist. Albigens. cap. ii, p. 556. 



A.D. 1200.] THE ALBIGENSES, 35 

mal food, their rigour exceeded that of the se- 
verest monks ; that, through ' their regard for 
truth, they admitted on no occasion any excuse 
for falsehood ; that, in a word, their charity al- 
ways prepared them to devote themselves to the 
welfare of others. * Several poems of the Vau- 
dois, written in the twelfth century, and recently 
pubhshed, confirm the resemblance between the 
doctrine and discipline of the early and later re- 
formers, f 

Activity and zeal for proselytism form another 
relation between the two reformations. Both 
began at a period when the human mind, eager 
for instruction, examined all that it had found es- 
tablished ; demanded a reason for all obedience ; 
and, at the same time that it overturned ancient 
civil dominations, to establish new ones, it also 
interrogated the ecclesiastical powers, to ascer- 
tain their foundation. The adoption of the re- 
formed opinion did not immediately announce it- 
..gelf as a heresjj^it was, in the eyes of the initi- 
a!tecr^"onTy a project of sanctification ; it was an 
engagement to greater zeal, to severer morals, to 
higher sacrifices, to a more constant occupation 
with spiritualthings. Since many prelates of the 
church had given the example of such reform, 
those who followed them did not consider them- 
selves as going astray ; and Rome herself had 
sometimes considered the paterins, the catharins, 
the poor of Lyon, and all those new rehgiousso- 

* Petri Vallis Cera. Hist. Albig. de diverais haereticorum seclia 
torn. V. 556, 557. 

t Choix des poesies originales des Troubadours, torn. ii. La 
nobla leycaon, lo novel Sermoni &c. 



36 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1200. 

cieties, as so many orders of monks who were 
rousing the fervour of the puhhc, and who never 
thought of shaking off her yoke. * Innocent III, 
who, ascended the pontifical throne in the vigour 
of his age, was the first wiio appeared to feel the 
importance of that independent spirit which was 
already degenerating into revolt. His predeces- 
sors, engaged in a perilous struggle with the two 
Henrys, and Frederic Barbarossa, thought their 
entire force not too much to defend them against 
the emperors ; and, in those times, had them- 
selves accepted the name oipaterins, which had • 
been given to their most zealous partisans.! But 
Innocent 111, whose genius at once embraced and 
governed the universe, was as incapable of tem- 
porising as he was of pity. At the same time 
that he destroyed the political balance of Italy 
and Germany ; that he menaced by turns the 
kings of Spain, of France, and of England ; that 
he affected the tone of a master with the kings of 
Bohemia, of Hungary, of Bulgaria, of Norway, 
and of Armenia ; in a word, that he directed or 
repressed at his will the Crusaders, who were oc- 
cupied in overturning the Greek empire and in 
establishing that of the Latins at Constantino- 
ple ; — Innocent 111, as if he had had no other 
occupation, watched over, attacked, and punish^ 
ed, all opinions different from those of the Ro- 
man church, all independence of mind, every ex- 

* Muratori Antiq. Ital. Dissert. 60, torn, v, p. 83. 

tArnulphi Hist. Mediol. lib. iv, [c. xi, p, 39. Landulphi 
Senior. Hist. Mediol. Prolog. 57. In Muratori Script. Ital. 
torn. iv. 



A.D. 1200 ] THE ALBIGENSES. 37 

ercise of the faculty of thinking in the affairs of re- 
ligion.* 

Though it was in the countries where the pro- 
vencal language was spoken, and especially in 
Languedoc, that the reformation of the Paterins 
had made the greatest progress, it had also spread 
rapidly in other parts of Christendom, in Italy, in 
Flanders, in Lorraine,! in Germany, and in 
Spain. Innocent III, both from character and 
policy, judged that the church ought to keep no 
measures with the sectaries ; that if it did not 
crush them, if it did not exterminate their race, 
and strike Christendom with terror, their example 
would soon be followed, and that the fermenta- 
tion of mind, which was every where manifest, 
would shortly produce a conflagration throughout 
the Roman world. Instead therefore of making 
converts, he charged his ministers to burn the 
leaders, to disperse the flocks, and to confiscate 
the property of every one who would not think 
as he did. At first, he required of those provin- 
ces, where the reformation bad made but small 
progress, to give the example of persecution ; 
and, in reality, many leaders of the new church 
perished in the flames at Nevers, in 11 98 and the 
following years. J The emperor Otho IV, who 

* See the immep=3e collection of the letters of Innocent III in 16 
books, of which each contains more than 100 letters : A. Steph. 
Balusio edit. 2 vols, in fol. 16S2 : see also the most important in 
Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 

t The Albigenses, about the year 1200, made proselytes at 
Metz; and circulated there the Sacred Scriptures, translated 
from the Latin into the Roman language. Calmet, Historie de 
Lorraine, tom. ii, liv. xxii, ch. cxxiv, p. 199. 

X Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 130. Pagi critica ad ann. 
J179, § vi,p. 656. 



38 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1200. 

regarded himself as a creature of Innocent III, 
granted him an edict for the destruction of the 
paterins, called also Gazari,^ in Italy. But 
there was a certain number of lords and high 
barons, who had themselves adopted the new 
opinions, and who, instead of consenting to perse- 
cute, protected the sectaries. Others saw in 
them only industrious vassals, whom they could 
not destroy without affecting their own revenues 
and power. Innocent III, therefore, sought to 
arm a present interest, and brutal avarice, against 
this calculating economy of the barons. He aban- 
doned to them the confiscation of all the here- 
tics' property, and exhorted them to take posses- 
sion of it, after they had banished those whom 
they had plundered, and threatened them with 
death if they returned to their homes. At the 
same time. Innocent III, laid under an anathe- 
ma those of the lords who should refuse to seize 
upon the property of the heretics, and placed 
their dominions under an interdict. f 

The province of Narbonne was more particu- 
larly the object of Innocent's attention. In the 
year 1193, the first ol his pontificate, he sent 
into it two monks of Citeg.ux, brother Guy and 
brother Regnier, who may be considered as hav- 
ing laid the foundations of the Inquisition. 
Their commission was to discover and pursue 
heresy; being invested, for that purpose, with 
all the authority of the holy See. The follow- 

*Edictum Ferrariae promulgatum, 1210 ; apud Muratorii Antiq. 
Ital. dissert. Ix, p. 89, 80. 

t Innocentii 111 Epistolae, lib. i, epist. 81, 82. 95. 165. Ray- 
ualdiAnn. 1198. § 36, 37, p. 12. 



A.D. 1200.] THE ALBIGENSES. 39 

ing year the pope named brother Regnier his le- 
gate in the four provinces of Embrun, Aix, Aries, 
and Narbonne, and enjoined upon the four arch- 
bishops, and all the bishops, to execute scrupu- 
lously the orders of this monk. Regnier having 
fallen sick, Innocent joined to him Peter of Cas- 
telnau, archdeacon of Maguelonne, whose zeal, 
more furious than that of his predecessors, is wor- 
thy of those sentiments which the very name of 
the inquisition inspires.* 

The mission of the pope's commissaries, or in- 
quisitors, was not however limited to scrutinizing 
the consciences of the heretics, confiscating their 
property, banishing, or sending them to the 
stake ; they traversed the province, accompa- 
nied by a number of friars, who arrived suc- 
cessively to their aid ; they preached and dis- 
puted against those who had wandered from the 
faith; and especially, when the lord of the place 
favoured the new opinions, not being able to em- 
ploy force, they had recourse to the power of 
their disputations. They caused judges of these 
intellectual combats, to be named, beforehand, 
and, if we may believe their own relations, they 
always came off victorious. Accustomed to the 
subtilities of the schools, they pressed their ad- 
versaries with captious questions, or unlooked for 
conclusions, and not unfrequently led them to 
absurd declarations. Diego d' Azebez, bishop 
of Ozma, and his companion St. Dominic, under- 
prior of his cathedral, wdio about the year 1204, 
fixed themselves in the province, to preach 

* Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 131. 



40 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1200. 

against the heretics, had much success in this 
kind of disputation ; it even appears that some- 
times they were out of patience with their an- 
tagonists, for being so unskilful.* But when the 
missionaries had embarrassed their adversaries, or 
had vanquished them according to all the scho- 
lastic rules, then they said to the inhabitants of 
the places where they had found them, ' Why 
do you not drive them out ? Why do you not 
exterminate them ?' — ' We cannot,' they rephed 
to the bishop of Ozma ; ' we have been brought 
up with them, we have relations amongst them, 
and we see the goodness of their lives.' — ' Thus,' 
says a contemporary writer, ' does the spirit of 
falsehood, only by the appearance of a pure and 
spotless life, lead away these inconsiderate people 
from the truth.' f 

Another cause, it is true, abated the persecu- 
tion. The inquisitors had, by their arrogance, 
offended all classes of society, and had raised up 
against themselves a cloud of enemies. Some 



* In a dispute between the bishop of Ozma and some heretics of 
Verfeuil, he asked them how they should understand the name Son 
of Man, which Jesus always gives himself in St. John, and in par- 
ticular this passage of St. John iii. 13. ' Also no one hath as- 
cended up into heaven, but he who descended from heaven, 
that is the Son of Man who is in heaven.^ They answered, that 
Jesus acknowledged himself as the son of a man who was in heav- 
en. ' But,' rejoined the bishop, ' the Lord has in said Isaiah, * the 
heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool.' The legs 
of that man who is in the heaven must then be as long as the dis- 
tance which separates the heavens from the earth.' ' W^ithout 
doubt,' they replied. ' The good God curse you,' said the holy 
bishop, ' stupid heretics as you are. I thought you had moresub- 
tility than that.' Chronica magistri Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii 
cap. viii. Duchesne Scr. Franc, torn, v, p. 672. 

t Guillelmi de Podio Laiirentii, cap, viii, p. 672, 



A.D. 1200.] THE ALBIGENSES. 41 

bishops they accused of simony, others of negli- 
gence in the fulfilment of their duties ; and under 
such pretences deposed the archbishop of Nar- 
bonne, and the bishops of Toulouse and Viviers. 
They offended also all the regular clergy; and 
at the same time tormented the count of Toul- 
ouse, and all the lords of the country, by accusa- 
tions continually renewed. Thus they deprived 
themselves of the means of kindling so many 
fires as they could have desired. To gain a httle 
popularity, therefore, they took great pains to 
confound the heretics with the routiers, or hire- 
ling soldiers. The companies of these, gener- 
ally composed, in a great measure, of strangers, 
were still known, in the South, by the name of 
bands of Catalans, as they were, in the North, by 
that of Brabancons. The routiers were lawless 
banditti ; they pillaged the churches and the 
priests, but had, in truth, no connexion with the 
heretics, and took no interest in doctrinal ques- 
tions and controversies. They, however, were 
offended with the preachings directed against 
them, and in their turn avenged themselves 
against the missionaries and inquisitors.* 

The count of Toulouse, Raymond VI, w^ho 
had cultivated the friendship of the routiers, and 
who had employed their arms in his frequent 
wars, shared also their resentments. We know 
but imperfectly the history of the count of Tou- 
louse before the crusade. Raymond VI, who 
succeeded to his father, Raymond V, in 1194, at 

* Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, p. 138. Guillelmi de Po- 
dio Laurentii, cap, vi, p. 670. 



42 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1207. 

the age of thirty eight, had already, at the head 
of these routiers, of whom he had made himself 
captain, made war against many of his neigh- 
bom-s. He had disputed with the barons of 
Baux, and with many of the lords of Languedoc 
and Provence, as w^ell as wdth some of his own 
vassals ; and this was apparently the reason of 
his seeking the alliance of Peter II, king of Ara- 
gon, whilst his father and his ancestors had, on 
the contrary, endeavoured to repress the ambi- 
tion of that house. Raymond VI married his 
fourth wife, Eleanor, sister of Peter II, about the 
year 1200 ; and in 1205 he promised his son, af- 
terwards Raymond VII, to Sancha daughter, of 
the same king, who was but just born. 

Raymond VI was, in the spring of 1207, up- 
on the borders of the Rhone, occupied with the 
war which he was carrying on against the barons 
of Baux, and other lords of those countries, when 
the legate, Peter of Castelnau, undertook to make 
peace between them. He first made application 
to the barons, and obtained their promise, that if 
Raymond VI would acquiesce in their preten- 
sions, they would employ all their assembled for- 
ces in the extermination of the heretics. After 
having agreed with them upon the form of a trea- 
ty, the legate returned to the count of Toulouse, 
and required him to sign it. Raymond VI was 
nowise inclined to purchase, by the renunciation of 
his rights, the entrance into his states of a hostile 
army, who were to pillage or kill all those of his 
vassals whom the priests should indicate. He 
therefore refused his consent, and Peter of Cas- 
telnau, in his wrath, excommunicated him, laid 



A.D. 1207.] THE ALBIGENSES. 43 

his countiy under an interdict, and wrote to 
the pope, to obtain the confirmation of the sen- 
tence.* 

Audacious as was the conduct of his legate, 
Innocent III was determined to support him. He 
appears to have sought for an opportunity to 
commence hostihties ; being well persuaded, that 
after the progress which had been made in the 
public opinion, the executioners were not suffi- 
^cient tojiesti;o^Jieresy, but that the whole peo- 
plelnust Fe exposed to the sword of the military. 
To confirm the sentence of excommunication pro- 
nounced by his legate, he wrote himself to count 
Raymond, on the 29th of May, 1207, and his 
letter began with these words : ' If we could open 
your heart, we should find, and would point out 
to you, the detestable abominations that you have 
committed ; but as it is harder than the rock, it 
is in vain to strike it with the words of salvation : 
we cannot penetrate it. Pestilential man ! what 
pride has seized your heart, and what is your 
folly, to refuse peace with your neighbours, and 
to brave the divine laws by protecting the ene- 
mies of the faith ? If you do not fear eternal 
flames, ought you not to dread the temporal chas- 
tisements which you have merited by so many 
crimes ? ' f 

So insulting a letter, addressed to a sovereign, 
must have revolted his pride ; nevertheless, the 

* Petri Vallis Carnai Hist. Albigens. cap. iii, p. 559. Inno- 
ceiitii III, lib. x. ep. Ixix. — Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. 
xxvii, p. 146. 

t Innocentii III, lib. x, ep. Ixix, — Hist.Gen. de Languedoc^ lir. 
xxi, ch. xxxiii, p. 150. 



44 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1207. 

monk, Peter de Vaux Cernayj tells us, ^ the wars 
which the nobles of Provence carried on against 
him, through the industry of that man of God, 
Peter de Castelnau, and the excommunication 
which he published in every place against the 
count, compelled him, at last, to accept the same 
conditions of peace, and to engage himself by 
oath to their observance, but as often as he swore 
to observe them, so many times he perjured him- 
self.'* 

Neither Peter de Castelnau, nor the pope, 
knew any other means of conversion than war, 
murder, and fire. In this same year, 1207, In- 
nocent III thought, for the first time, of preaching 
a crusade against the sectaries ; and since the 
princes of the country appeared too slow in ex- 
terminating them, he projected the calling in of 
strangers to accomplish this work. On the 17th 
of November, he wrote to Philip Augustus, ex- 
horting him to declare war against the heretics, 
the enemies of God and the church ; and prom- 
ising him, in reward, in this life the confiscation 
of all their goods, and in the other, the same in- 
dulgences as were granted to those, who combat- 
ed the infidels in the holy land. At the same 
time, he addressed similar letters to the duke of 
Burgundy, to the counts of Bar, of Nevers, and. 
ofDreux; to the countesses of Troie, of Ver- 
mandois, and of Blois; and to all the counts, bar- 
ons, knights, and faithful, of the kingdom of 
France. f Before, however, these letters had 

* Petri Vallls Cernai Hist. Albig. liv. iii, p. 159. 
f Innocentii III Epistote, lib. x, ep. cxlix. 



A.D. 1208.] THE, ALBIGENSES. 45 

produced any effect, abloody catastrophe redoub- 
led the rage of the pope and the bigots, and kind- 
led the sacred war. 

Count Raymond, when he signed the peace 
with his enemies, had engaged to exterminate the 
heretics from his states ; but Peter de Castelnau 
very soon judged, that he did net proceed in the 
work with adequate zeal. He went to seek him, 
reproached him to his face with his indulgence, 
which he termed baseness, treated him as per- 
jured, as a favorer of heretics, and a tyrant, and 
again excommunicated him. This violent scene 
appears to have taken place at St. Gilles, where 
count Raymond had given a meeting to the two 
legates. 

1208. This lord, exceedingly provoked, threat- 
ened to make Castelnau pay for his insolence 
with his life. The two legates, disregarding this 
threat, quitted the court of Raymond without a 
reconciliation, and came to sleep, on the night of 
the 14th of January, 1208, in a little inn by the 
side of the Rhone, which river they intended to 
pass the next day. One of the count's gentle- 
men happened to meet them there, or perhaps 
had followed them. On the morning of the 15th, 
after mass, this gentleman entered into a dispute 
with Peter de Castelnau, respecting heresy and 
its punishment. The legate had never spared the 
most insulting epithets to the advocates of toler- 
ance, the gentleman already irritated by the quar- 
rel with his lord, and now feeling himself person- 
ally offended, drew his poignard, struck the le* 



46 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1208. 

gate in the side, and killed him.* The intelli- 
gence of this murder excited Innocent III to 
the greatest excess of wrath. Raymond VI had 
by no means so direct a part in the death of Cas- 
telnau, whom the church regarded as a martyr, 
as had Henry II in the death of Thomas a 
Becket. But Innocent III was more haughty 
and implacable, than Alexander III had been. 
He immediately published a bull, addressed to 
all the counts, barons, and knights of the four 
provinces of the Southern Gaul, in which he de- 
clared that it was the devil who had instigated his 
principal minister, Raymond, count of Toulouse, 
against the legate of the holy see. He laid un- 
der an interdict, all the places which should af- 
ford a refuge to the murderers of Castelnau ; he 
demanded that Raymond of Toulouse should be 
publicly anathematised in all the churches ; ' and 
as,' added he, ' following the canonical sanctions 
of the holy fathers, we must not observe faith to- 
wards those who keep not faith towards God, or 
who are separated from the communion of the 
faithful, we discharge, by apostolic authority, all 
those who beheve themselves bound towards this 
count, by any oath either of alliance or of fideli- 
ty; we permit every catholic man, saving the 
right of his principal lord, to pursue his per- 
son, to occupy and retain his territories, es- 

* Petri VaJlis Ccrn. cap. viii, p. 563. Historia de los grans 
faicts d'armas et gi erras de Tolo?a, p. iii. This is a Languedo- 
ciaii chronicle inserted amongst the proofs of the third volume of 
the history of Languedoc. — Chronol. Roberli Aliissiodorensisj torn, 
xviii, p. 275. 



A.D.1208.] THE ALBIGENSES. 47 

pecially for the purpose of exterminating here- 
sy.'* 

This first bull was speedily followed by other 
letters equally fulminating, from Innocent III to 
all who were capable of assisting in the destruc- 
tion of the count of Toulouse. He addressed Phi- 
lip Augustus, exhortingf ' him to carry on in per- 
son this sacred war of extermination against 
Jieretics, (who are, said he, far worse than the 
Saracens,) and to strip the count of Toulouse of 
all his possessions. He wrote, at the same time 
to the archbishops of Lyons and Tours, to the 
bishops of Paris and Nevers, and to the abbot of 
Citeaux, to engage their concurrence in this holy 
enterprise.! 

Galono, cardinal deacon of Saint Mary dello 
Portico, whom the pope sent with these letters to 
France, does not appear to have obtained much 
credit with King Philip, who was, at that time, 
more occupied by his rivalry with the Kino- of 
England, and with Otho of Germany, than with 
heresy. .j: But the monks of Citeaux, who had, 
at the same time, received powers from Rome, 
to preach the crusade amongst the people, gave 
themselves to the work with an ardour which 
had not been equalled even by the hermit Peter, 
or Foulques de Neuilly. Innocent III, impelled 
by hatred, had offered to those who should take 
the cross against the Provencals, the utmost ex- 
tent of indulgence which his predecessors hadev- 

* Petri Vallis Cern. cap. viii, p. 564. 
tinnocentii III, Epii^t. lib. xi, Ep. 27.28. SO. 32, &c. 
4:Lettre de Philippe Aiiguste a Ravmond, dans les preuve* 
de 'IHistoire de Languedoc, torn, iii, p. 210. 



48 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1208. 

er granted to those who laboured for the dehver- 
ance of the holy land. As soon as these new 
Crusaders had assumed the sacred sign of the 
cross, (which, to distinguish themselves from 
those of the East, they wore on the breast in- 
stead of the shoulders,) they were instantly pla- 
ced under the protection of the holy see, freed 
from the payment of the interest of their debts, 
and exempted from the jurisdiction of all the tri- 
bunals ; whilst the war which they were invited 
to carry on, at their doors, almost without danger 
or expense, was to expiate all the vices and 
crimes of a whole life. The belief in the power 
of these indulgencies, which we can scarcely 
comprehend, was not yet abated ; the barons of 
France never doubted, that, whilst fighting in the 
holy land they had the assurance of paradise. 
But those distant expeditions had been attended 
with so many disasters ; so many hundreds of 
thousands had perished in Asia, or by the way, 
from hunger, or misery, or sickness, that others 
wanted courage to follow them. It was then, 
with transports of joy, that the faithful received 
the new pardons which were offered them, and so 
much the more, that far from regarding the return 
they were called upon to make, as painful or 
dangerous, they would willingly have undertaken 
it for the pleasure alone of doing it. War was 
their passion, and pity for the vanquished had 
never troubled their pleasure. The discipline of 
the holy wars was much less severe than that of 
the political, whilst the fruits of victory were 
much more alluring. In them, they might, with- 
out remorse, as well as without restraint from 



A.D. 1208.] THE ALBIGENSES*^ 49 

their officers, pillage all the property, massacre all 
the men, and violate the women and children. 
The crusaders to the East well knew that the 
distance was so great, as to give them little chance 
of bringing home the booty which they had gain- 
ed by their swords ; but instead of riches, which 
the faithful were to seek at a distance, and tear 
from barbarians, of whose language they were ig- 
norant, they were offered the harvest of a neigh- 
bouring field, the spoil of a house which they 
might carry to their own, and captives, abandon- 
ed to their desires, who spoke the same language 
with themselves. Never therefore had the cross 
been taken up with a more unanimous consent. 
The first to engage, through the commands of their 
pastors, in this war which was denominated sacred, 
were Eudes III, duke of Burgundy ; Simon de 
Montfort, count of Leicester ; the counts of Ne- 
vers, of St Paul, of Auxerre, of Geneve, and of 
Forez.* 

The abbot of Giteaux, Arnold Amalric, distin- 
guished himself with his whole congregation, by 
his zeal in preaching this war of extermination ; 
the convents of his order (the Bernardins,) of 
which there were already seven or eight hundred 
in France, Italy, and Germany, appropriated the 
Crusade against the Albigenses as their special 
province. In the name of the pope, and of the 
apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, they promised, 
to all who should perish in this holy expedition, 

*Rigordus de Gestis Philippi Augusti, p. 62et finis. Guil- 

klm. Armoricus, p. 82. Chroniques de Saint-Denys, p. 394. 

Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. xli, p. 156. Historia 

de los grans faicts d' armas. p. 4. 

3 



50 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1208. 

plenary absolution of all sins, committed from the 
day of their birth, to that of their death. But 
whilst the Bernardins were recruiting soldiers for 
the cross, Innocent III charged a new congre- 
gation, (at the head of which he placed the Span- 
iard, Saint Dominic,) to go on foot, two by two, 
through the villages, to preach the faith in the 
midst of them, to enlighten them by controversial 
discussions, to display to them all the zeal of 
Christian charity, and to obtain from their confi- 
dence exact information as to the number and 
dwellings of those who had wandered from the 
church, in order to burn them when the opportu- 
nity should arrive. Thus began the order of the 
preaching brethren of St. Dominic,* or of the in- 
quisitors. The new bishop of Toulouse, Foul- 
ques, or Fouquet, a native of Marseilles, who had 
formerly distinguished himself as a troubadour, 
and who, quitting love and poetry, had thrown 
himself into the ranks of the persecutors, appears 
to have suggested to Innocent III the prin- 
cipal rules of this order, the experiment of which 
was made for seven years in his diocese, be- 
fore the pope confirmed it in the council of La- 
teran.f 

1208. The crusaders were not ready to march 
this year, but their immense preparations resound- 
ed throughout Europe, and filled Languedoc 
with terror. It was well known that , the coun- 
tries destined to vengeance and extermination, by 

* Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. x, p. 673. 

t Theodoricus in Vita Sancti Dominici, lib. i, cap. tilt. Apiid 
Surium, torn, iv, die 4 August!. — Raynaldi Annal. 1215, § xvii. p- 
245. 



A.D. 1208.] THE ALBIGENSES. 51 

the monks of Citeaux, as being more particularly 
the seats of heresy, were the states of Raymond 
VI, count of Toulouse, and those of his nephew 
Raymond Roger viscount of Alby, Beziers, Car- 
cassonne, and Limoux in Rasez. Although Ray- 
mond of Toulouse had been a soldier of some dis- 
tinction, he was mild, feeble, and timid, desirous 
of saving his subjects from confiscations and pun- 
ishments, but still more desirous of saving himself 
from persecution. His nephew, on the contrary, 
.was generous, lofty, and impetuous ; he was 
twenty-four years of age ; he had succeeded his 
father fourteen years before, and during his mi- 
nority his states had been governed by guardians 
inclined to the new doctrines. These two prin- 
ces, having learned that Arnold, abbot of Citeaux, 
leader of the crusade, had been nominated, by 
the pope, his legate in those provinces from which 
he designed to eradicate heresy, and that he had 
assembled a council of the chiefs of the sacred 
war, at Aubenaz, in the Vivarais, went thither to 
avert the storm, if possible. They protested that 
they were strangers to heresy ; that they were 
innocent of the death of Peter of Castelnau ; and 
they demanded at least to be heard, before they 
were condemned. The legate received them 
with extreme haughtiness, declared that he could 
do nothing for them, and that, if they wished to 
obtain any mitigation of the measures adopted 
against them, they must address themselves to 
the pope. Raymond Roger perceived by this 
language, that nothing was to be expected from 
negotiation, and that there remained no alterna- 
tive but to place garrisons in all their strong 



5^ CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1208. 

towiiSj and to prepare valiantly for their defence. 
But Raymond VI, overwhelmed with terror, de- 
clared himself ready to submit to any thing ; to 
be himself the executor of the violence of the 
ecclesiastics against his own subjects ; and to make 
war against his family, rather than draw the cru- 
saders into his states. The two relations, not 
being able to agree upon the conduct they were 
to pursue, separated, with reproaches and mena- 
ces. Raymond Roger retired into his states, and 
immediately put himself into a defensive condi- 
tion ; he even began hostilities against the count 
of Toulouse, whose attacks he apprehended; 
whilst Raymond VI, after having assembled his 
most faithful servants at Aries, engaged the arch- 
bishop of Auch, the abbot of Condom, the prior 
of the Hospitalers of Saint Gilles, and Bernard, 
lord of Rabasteens in Bigorre, to proceed to Rou- 
en, in order to oifer his submission to Innocent III, 
and receive his indulgence.* 

Raymond VI at the same time applied for the 
protection of his cousin, Philip Augustus King of 
France, and thatof Otho King of Germany. The 
former at first received him with fair words, but 
afterward took occasion from the solicitations of 
Raymond to his rival, Otho^ to refuse him all as- 
sistance.! The ambassadors of Raymond to the 
pope, were on the contrary, received with appa- 
rent indulgence. It was required of them that 
their master should make common cause with the 



*Historia de las Armas j p. 4, 5, 6. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. 
xxi, ch.xlii, p.. 157. Hist Albigens. Petri Vallis Cern.c.ix,p. 
566. 

t Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. xiii, p. 674. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 53 

crusaders ; that he should assist them in extermi- 
nating the heretics ; and that he should surrender 
to them seven of his best castles, as a pledge of 
his intentions. Upon these conditions the pope 
not only gave Raymond the hope of absolution, 
but promised him his entire favour.*" Innocent 
III was, however, far from having pardoned Ray- 
mond in the bottom of his heart. For, at this 
same epoch, he wrote to the bishops of Riez and 
Conserans, and to the abbot of Citeaux, 'We 
counsel you, with the apostle Paul, to employ 
guile with regard to this count, for in this case it 
ought to be called prudence. We must attack, 
separately, those who are separated from unity, 
leave for a time the count of Toulouse, employ- 
ing towards him a wise dissimulation, that the 
other heretics may be the more easily defeated, 
and that afterwards we may crush him when he 
shall be left alone /f We cannot but remark, 
that whenever ambitious and perfidious priests 
had any disgraceful orders to communicate, they 
never failed to pervert, for this purpose, some 
passages of the holy Scriptures ; one would say 
that they had only studied the Bible to make 
sacrilegious applications of it. 

All the fanatics whom the preachings of the 
monks of Citeaux had engaged to devote them- 
selves to the sacred war, began to move in the 
spring of the year 1209. The indulgence of the 
crusade had been offered to them on the lowest 

*Historia de los faicts d'armas, p . 6. Petri Cern. Hist. Albi- 
gens- cap.xi.p, 567, 

t Innocentii HI Epist. lib. xi. Ep. 232. Hist, gen de Langue- 
doc Jiv. xxi . p. 160. 



54 " CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209 

terms ; they were required to make a compalgn 
of only forty days, (to which the greater part of 
the vassals were obliged by the service of their 
fiefs,) in exchange for eternal salvation. The 
shorter the service was, the better it suited the 
neighbouring provinces. 

It was, in fact, principally amongst the near 
neighbours of the Albigenses, that the Bernardins 
found means to draw after them nearly the whole 
population. Some authors have spoken of three 
hundred, or even of five hundred thousand 
pilgrims or crusaders who precipitated themselves 
upon Languedoc ; the abbot of Vaux Cernay 
reckons but fifty thousand in this first campaign, 
and the smallest number is the most probable, 
especially in that age when very numerous armies 
were so seldom seen. We must not, however, 
include in this calculation the ignorant and 
fanatical multitude which followed each preacher, 
armed with scythes and clubs, and promised to 
themselves that if they were not in condition to 
combat the knights of Languedoc, they might, 
at least, be able to murder the women and chil- 
dren of the heretics. Several places had been 
assigned for the assembling of the crusaders. 
Arnold Amalric, abbot of Citeaux, legate of the 
pope, and chief director of the crusade, collected 
at Lyons the greatest number of combatants, 
principally those who had taken arms in the 
kingdom of Aries, and who were vassals of Otho 
IV ; the archbishop of Bourdeaux had assembled 
a second body in the Agenois ; these were 
subjects of the King of England ; the bishop of 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 55 

Puy commanded a third body in the Velay, who 
were subjects of Philip Augustus. * 

When count Raymond VI learned that these 
terrible band of fanatics were about to move, and 
that they were all directed towards his states, he 
hastened to represent to the pope, that the legate 
Arnold who conducted them, was his personal 
enemy, and ' it would be unjust' said he ' to 
profit by my submission, todeHver me to the mercy 
of a man who would listen only to his resentment 
against me.' To take from the count of Toulouse, 
in appearance, this motive for complaint. Innocent 
III named a new legate, Milon his notary or 
secretary ; but far from endeavouring, by this 
means, to restrain the hatred of the abbot of 
Citeaux, his only aim was to deceive Raymond ; 
^ for the lord pope expressly said to this new 
legate, let the abbot of Citeaux do every thing, 
and be thou only his organ ; for in fact the count 
of Toulouse has suspicions concerning him, whilst 
he does not suspect thee.' f 

The nearer the crusaders approached, the more 
the count of Toulouse, who had given himself 
into their power, was struck with terror. On the 
one hand, he endeavored to gain the affections of 
his subjects, by granting new privileges to some, 
and pardoning the offences of others who had 
incurred his resentment ; % on the other hand, he 

* Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xvi, p. 571 . Historia 
de los faicts d'armas, p . 8 et seq. Hist, gen de Languedoc, liv. xxi, 
ch.liii,p.l67,16S. 

t Hist. Albigens. Petri Vail. Cern. cap. x,p. 566. 

4 Remissio Consulibus et habitatoribus Nemausi; — Preuves de 
Languedoc, p. 211. 



56 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

consented to purchase his absolution from the 
hands of the pope's legate, by the most humihating 
concessions. He consigned to the apostolic 
notary seven of his principal castles, as a pledge 
of his fidelity ; he permitted the consuls of his 
best cities to engage to abandon him if he should 
depart from the conditions imposed upon him ; 
he submitted beforehand to the judgment which 
the legate should pronounce upon fifteen accusa- 
tions which the agents of the persecution had laid 
against him ; and finally, he suffered himself on 
the 18th of June to be conducted into the church 
of St. Gilles, with a cord about his neck and his 
shoulders naked, and there received the disci- 
pline around the altar. After all these humilia- 
tions, he was allowed to take the cross against 
the heretics, and it was by favor that he was per- 
mitted to join those who were about to attack his 
nephew, becoming their guide for that pur- 
pose. * 

The principal army of the crusaders descended 
the valley of the Rhone by Lyons, Valence, 
Montelimart and Avignon. The count of Tou- 
louse went to meet it at Valence ; he conducted 
it to Montpellier where it passed some days. In 
this city the young Raymond Roger, viscount of 
Beziers, came also to seek the legate with a view 
of making his peace. According to the ancient 
chronicle of Toulouse, he told him ' that he had 
done the church no • wrong, and wished to do 
none ; but that if his people and officers had re- 

*Acta inter Innocentii Epistolas, torn, ii, p. 347, et seq. Hist. 
Albigens. Petri, cap. xii.p. 568. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, Uvl 
XXI, p. 162. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 57 

ceived and supported any heretics or other per- 
sons, in his domain, that he was innocent of it 
and not to blame ; and that those ought to pay 
and satisfy, and not he, considering his disposi- 
tion ; and that the said officers had always gov- 
erned his territory to this hour ; praying and sup- 
plicating the said legate and council, to receive 
him to mercy, for he was servant to the church, 
and for her wished to live and die towards and 
against every one.' — To which the legate replied 
that what he had to do was to defend himself the 
best that he could, for he , should shew him no 
mercy. * 

Indeed, from that time, the viscount of Beziers 
thought only of making a vigorous defence. He 
called to him all his vassals, all his friends and 
allies, and communicated to them the offers which 
he had made ; he informed them of the manner 
in which they had been received, and found them 
as determined as he was, to defend themselves. 
It was very far from being the case, that all who 
took arms with him were heretics, but the mass 
of the crusaders, whose arrival they had beheld, 
was so disorderly, so eager to shed blood in hon- 
or of the church, so impatient for action, without 
asking or receiving any explanation, that no one 
dared to take the chance of its errors, and that 
all the barons and knights were eager to shut 
themselves up in their castles, to summon their 
peasants, and to provision themselves there, that 
they might be able to resist the first attack. 
Some castles, as Servian and Puy-la-rouque, 

* Historia de los faicts d'armas de Tolosa. p. 7. 



58 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

were abandoned at the approach of these fanat- 
ics ; others, as Caussadi and St. Antonin, where 
there was no suspicion of heretics, ransoned 
themselves by heavy contributions. Villemur 
was burned. Chasseneuil, after a vigorous resist- 
ance, capitulated. The garrison obtained per- 
mission to retire with what they could carry, but 
the inhabitants, being suspected of heresy, were 
abandoned to the mercy of the legate. The cru- 
saders regarded their capture as the object and 
recompense of their enterprise. Men and women 
were all precipitated into the flames, amidst the 
acclamations of their ferocious conquerors ; all the 
wealth found in the castle was afterwards given up 
to pillage. * 

But Raymond Roger had chiefly calculated 
on the defence of his two great cities, Beziers, 
and Carcassonne ; he had divided between them 
his most valiant knights, and the rentiers who 
were attached to his fortune. He had first visited 
Beziers to assure himself that this place was pro- 
vided with every thing, and to exhort the citi- 
zens vahantly to defend their lives. He had 
then shut himself up in Carcassonne, a city built 
upon a rock partly surrounded by the river Aude, 
and whose two suburbs were themselves encir- 
cled by walls and ditches. The citizens of Be- 
ziers felt themselves intimidated, when they knew 
that their young viscount quitted them for a place 
of grester strength; their inquietude redoubled 
when they saw the crusaders arrive, whose three 

* Hist, gen deLanguedoc, liv. XXI, ch. Ivi, p. 168. Historiade 
los faicts d'armas, p. 18. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 59 

bodies united under their walls after the middle 
of July 1209. They had been preceded by 
Reginald of Montpeyroux bishop of Beziers, who 
after having visited the legate, and delivered to 
him a list of those, amongst his flock, whom he 
suspected of heresy, and whom he wished to see 
consigned to the flames, returned to his parish- 
ioners, to represent the dangers to which they 
were exposed, and to exhort them to surrender 
their fellow citizens to the avengers of the faithy 
rather than to draw upon themselves, and upon 
their wives and children, the wrath of heaven and 
the church. ' Tell the legate,' replied the citi- 
zens, whom he had assembled in the cathedral of 
St. Nicaise, ^ that our city is good and strong, 
that our Lord will not fail to succour us in our 
great necessities, and that, rather than commit 
the baseness demanded of us, we would eat oiu' 
own children.' Nevertheless, there was no heart 
so bold as not to tremble, when the pilgrims 
were encamped under their walls ; ' and so great 
was the assemblage both of tents and pavilions, 
that it appeared as if all the world was collected 
there ; at which those of the city began to be 
greatly astonished, for they thought they were 
only fables, what their bishop had come to tell 
them, and advise them.'* 

The citizens of Beziers, though astonished, 
were not discouraged ; whilst their enemies were 
still occupied in tracing their camp, they made a 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 9, 10. Historia Albigens. 
Petri Val. Cern. cap. xv, p. 570. Prreclara Fiancor. facinora 
apud Duchesne, torn, v, p. 765. Bernardi Guidonis Vita Inno- 
centii III, p. 481, apud Muratorii, torn, iii, Script. Ital. 



60 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

sally, and attacked them at unawares. But the 
crusaders were still more terrible, compared with 
the inhabitants of the south, by their fanaticism 
and boldness, than by their numbers. The in- 
fantry alone sufficed to repulse the citizens with 
great loss. At this instant, all the battahons of 
the besiegers, precipitating themselves upon them 
at the same time, pursued them so eagerly that 
they entered the gates with them, and found 
themselves masters of the city before they had 
even formed their plan of attack. The knights, 
learning that they had triumphed without fight- 
mg, inquired of the legate, Arnold Amalric, 
abbot of Citeaux, how they should distinguish 
the catholics from the heretics, who made 
them this much celebrated reply : ' Kill them 
all: the Lord will know well those who are 
his.' * 

The fixed population of Beziers did not per- 
haps, exceed fifteen thousand persons ; but all 
the inhabitants of the country, of the open villa- 
ges, and of the castles which hadjnot been judged 
capable of defence, had taken refuge in this city, 
which was regarded as exceedingly strong ; and 
even those who had remained to guard the strong 
castles, had, for the most part, sent their wives 
and children to Beziers. This whole multitude, 
at the mom.ent when the crusaders became mas- 
ters of the gates, took refuge in the churches ; 
the great cathedral of Saint Nicaise contained the 

* Csesar Heisterbachiensis, lib. v, cap. 21. In Bibliotheca 
Patrum Cisterciensium, torn, ii, p. 139. Raynaldi Annal.Eccles. 
1209, 5 xxii. p. 186. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. Ivii, p> 
169. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 61 

greater number ; the canons, clothed with their 
choral habits, surrounded the altar, and sounded 
the bells as if to express their prayers to the fu- 
rious assailants ; but these supplications of brass 
were as little heard as those of the human voice. 
The bells ceased not to sound, till, of that im- 
mense multitude, which had taken refuge in the 
church, the last had been massacred. Neither 
were those spared who had sought an asylum in 
the other churches ; seven thousand dead bodies 
were counted in that of the Magdalen alone. 
When the crusaders had massacred the last hv- 
ing creature in Beziers, and had pillaged the 
houses of all that they thought worth carrying 
off, they set fire to the city, in every part at 
once, and reduced it to a vast funereal pile. Not 
a house remained standing, not one human being 
alive. Historians differ as to the number of vic- 
tims. The abbot of Citeaux, feeling some shame 
for the butchery which he had ordered, in his 
letter to Innocent III, reduces it to fifteen thous- 
and, others make it amount to sixty. * 

The terror inspired by the massacre at Be- 
ziers, caused all the country places to be desert- 
ed. None appeared strong enough to resist an 
army, which, in a single day, had taken and de- 
stroyed the capital. The inhabitants preferred 



*Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. lvii,p. 169. Historia 
de los faicts d'armas de Tolosa, p. 11. Chronicon Guillelmi de 
Nangis. p. 488. Guillelmus Armoricus, p. 92. Philippidos, lib. 
viii, p. 220. Innocentii III Epist. lib. xii. Ep. 108. Chron. de 
St. Denys,p. 40S. Roberti Altissiodorens. torn, xviii, p. 276. Ber- 
nard Itier of Limoges, a contemporary, makes the number of tlie 
slain 38,000; Chronicon. torn, xvii; p. 227, and Alberic, monk of 
the three fountains 60,000. Ibid. p. 775. 



62 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209' 

taking refuge in the woods and mountains, to 
waiting for such enemies, within the enclosure of 
walls, which might serve them for a prison. As 
there was not a knight in all France whose 
dwelling was not fortified, the number of castles, 
"in the two dioceses of Beziers and Carcassonne, 
was immense ; but the crusaders found more than 
a hundred of them deserted. They still advan- 
ced, however, unsatiated with blood, and on the 
1st of August arrived before Carcassonne. That 
city was then entirely built on the right of the 
Aude ; the young viscount had augmented its 
fortifications, and it was defended by a numerous 
garrison. On the following day, an attack was 
made upon one of the suburbs, and after a com- 
bat of two hours, during which Raymond Roger 
on one side, and count Simon de Montfort on the 
other, gave proofs of extraordinary valor, it was 
taken. The assailants then proceeded to the 
attack of the second suburb, but were repulsed 
with loss. For eight days the besieged continu- 
ed to defend it with success ; they at last evacu- 
ated it, and having set it on fire, they abandoned 
it to their enemies, and retired into the city.* 

King Peter II of Aragon, whom the viscount 
of Beziers had acknowledged as his lord, be- 
held with chagrin the oppression of that young 
prince, his nephew. He came to the camp of 
the crusaders, he addressed himself to the count 
of Toulouse, his brother-in-law, whom he saw 
compelled to follow and second the enemies of 

*Historiade los faicts de Tolosa, p. 12. Petri Val, Cern. 
Hist. Albigens. cap. xvi, p. 571. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. 
xxi, cli. Ixxix, p. 171. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 63 

his country ; he offered himself as mediator be- 
tween him, the duke of Burgundy, and the le- 
gate, on one side, and the viscount on the other. 
Before they entered on any conditions, the abbot 
Arnold of Citeaux, who wished to obtain some 
information as to the state of the besieged, enga- 
ged the King of Aragon to enter himself into the 
city, to confer with Raymond Roger. The 
ycflmg viscount, after giving his lively thanks, 
said to him, ' If you wish to arrange for me any 
adjustment, in the form and manner which shall 
appear to you fitting, I will accept and ratify it 
without any contradiction ; for I see clearly, that 
we cannot maintain ourselves in this city, on ac- 
count of the multitude of countrymen, women, 
and children, who have taken refuge here. We 
cannot reckon them, and they die every day in 
great numbers. But were there only myself and 
my people here, I swear to you, that I would 
rather die of famine, than surrender to the legate.' 
When the King of Aragon had related this dis- 
course to the Abbot of Citeaux, he could better 
judge what sort of propositions he might make 
to a generous man, with the assurance that they 
would not be accepted ; for whilst he dared not 
absolutely repel such a mediator as the king of 
Aragon, yet he wished not to have a peace which 
should suspend the massacres. He therefore 
caused the viscount to be informed, that the only 
terms which could be granted him w^ere, that he 
might quit the city with twelve others, and that 
the remainder of the citizens and soldiers should 
be abandoned to his good pleasure. ' Rather 
than do what the legate demands of me,' replied 



64 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1209. 

Raymond Roger, ' I would suffer myself to be 
flayed alive. He shall not have the least of my 
company at his mercy, for it is on my account 
they are in danger.' Peter II approved the gen- 
erosity of his nephew, and turning towards the 
knights and citizens of Carcassonne, to whom 
these conditions had also been announced, he said 
to them, ' You now know what you have to 
expect ; mind and defend yourselves well, for he 
who defends himself always finds good mercy at 
last.' ^ 

The king of Aragon was scarcely departed, be- 
fore the crusaders made an assault upon the walls. 
They endeavored to fill the ditches with faggots, 
which they brought for that purpose, encouraging 
each other by loud shoutings. But, as soon as 
they approached the walls, the besieged poured 
upon them streams of boiling water and oil, they 
crushed them with stones and projectiles of every 
kind, and forced them to retire. The attack was 
prolonged, and many times renewed, but the as- 
sailants were at last obliged to retreat with great 
loss. The time was now approaching when the 
greater part of the crusaders would have finished 
their forty days' service ; they had reckoned up- 
on a miracle in their favour, and already had been 
repulsed in two assaults. The legate remarked 
in his army some symptoms of discouragement ; 
he therefore employed a gentleman related to the 
viscount, who happened to be with him, to enter 
into the city and renew the negociations. Ray- 
mond Roger, on his side, greatly desired an hon- 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa. p, 15^ 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 65 

curable capitulation, for he began to perceive the 
failure of water in the cisterns of the city, which 
the extreme heat of the season had dried up. 
He was so fully satisfied of the rectitude of his 
proceedings, that he could not but believe, when 
the injustice of which he had been the victim 
should be known, that it would excite the com- 
miseration of the great lords and the ecclesiastics, 
whom zeal for Christianity had alone armed 
against him. He persuaded himself, that if he 
could gain a hearing he should be able to re- 
move all the difficulties which he had hitherto 
encountered, and he only asked of the mediator 
who presented himself, to procure him a safe 
conduct, that he might repair to the camp of the 
crusaders. He obtained, both from the legate 
and the lords of the army, the most complete 
guarantee for his safety and liberty, and the prom- 
ise of the crusaders was confirmed by oaths. He 
then quitted the city, attended by three hundred 
knights, and presented himself at the tent of the 
legate, where allthe principal lords of the army 
were assembled. After having nobly and power- 
fully defended his conduct, he declared that he 
submitted, as he had always done, to the orders 
of the church, and that he awaited the decision 
of the council. 

But the legate was profoundly penetrated with 
the maxim of Innocent HI, that ' to keep faith 
with those who have it not, is an offence against 
the faith. '' He caused the young viscount to be 
arrested with all the knights who had followed 
him, and confided him to the care of Simon de 
Montfort. By this treachery, he thought to 
3 



QQ CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

Strike with terror the souls of the inhabitants of 
Carcassonne ; but the effect of it was precisely to 
withdraw from his power the victims whom he 
had destined to the flames. The citizens were 
acquainted with a secret passage by which they 
could escape from the town. It w^as a cavern, 
three leagues in length, which goes from Car- 
cassonne so far as the towers of Cabardes. Dur- 
ing the night they escaped by this cavern, aban- 
doning all their riches to the avidity of their ene- 
mies. The next morning, the besiegers were as- 
tonished at not seeing any person on the w^alls of 
the city ; but it required a considerable time to 
convince them that it was entirely deserted. 
They then entered, and the legate took posses- 
sion of the spoil in the name of the church, ex- 
communicating those of the crusaders who should 
have appropriated the smallest part. Neverthe- 
less, he thought himself obhged to dissemble the 
villainy to which he had recourse, and which had 
so badly succeeded. He announced that on the 
15th of August, the day of thejoccupation of the 
city, he had signed a capitulation, by which he 
permitted all the inhabitants to quit it with their 
lives only. He thought it also proper, for the 
honour of the holy church, not to let it be sup- 
posed that all the heretics had escaped him. His 
scouts had collected in the fields a certain num- 
ber of prisoners, and amongst the fugitives from 
Carcassonne some had been overtaken and 
brought to the camp. He had in his hands, be- 
sides, the three hundred knights who had accom- 
panied the viscount. Out of all these, he made 
choice J for execution of four hundred and fifty 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 67 

men and women, who might be suspected of her- 
esy. Four hundred he caused to be burned 
ahve, and the remaining fifty to be hanged. * 

The principal object of the crusade was now 
accomphshed: the count of Toulouse, who had 
been accused of favouring the heretics, had sub- 
mitted to the most degrading humiliations to make 
his peace. The viscount of Narbonne, to avoid 
the visit of the ciTisaders, had published against 
the heretics laws more rigorous than even the 
church demanded. f The viscount of Beziers 
was a prisoner ; his two strongest cities were de- 
stroyed, and the greater number of his castles 
contained not a single inhabitant. The French 
lords, who, to gain the pardons of the church, 
had marched to the crusade, began to feel some 
shame for all the blood which had been shed, and 
for their word which had been falsified. The 
knio^hts and soldiers having fulfilled the term of 
their service, demanded their dismissal ; but the 
abbot of Citeaux, the legate of the pope, alone 
felt that he had done enough. The sectaries 
were frozen with terror; they had concealed 

* The recitals of the ancient historians are so contradictory re- 
specting the taking of Carcassonne, that we can scarcely recog- 
nize the same event. I have followed the history in the provencal 
tongue, Des grands faicts d'armes de Tolouse, p. 16, 17, IS. And 
I have attributed to the desire of the legate to accredit a recital 
more honourable for him, the narration of the following, Epistolse 
Jnnocentii HI, apud Petrum Val,, Ed. 1615, p. 322, Prseclara 
Francor, facinora, p. 765. Guillelmi de Podjo Laurentii, cap. 
xiv, p. 674. Petri Val. Cern. Albigens., cap. xxi. p. 571. 
Philippidos, lib. viii, p. 220. Cfesar Heisterbachiensis, lib. v, 
cap. 21. It appears that the authors of I'histoire de Languedqc 
have judged the same, liv. xxi, chap. Ixi. See also Rob. Altissio- 
dor. t. 18, p. 276. 

f Histoiie de LanguedoCj liv. xxi, ch. Iviii, p. 169. 



68 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

themselves ; they were silent ; they would even 
be so, long after the departure of the' crusaders. 
But they were not destroyed ; their opinions 
would secretly circulate ; resentment for the out- 
rages already suffered would alienate them still 
more from the church, and the reformation would 
break forth afresh. To turn back the march of 
civilization, to obliterate the traces of a mighty 
progress of the human mind, it was not sufficient 
to sacrifice, for an example, some thousands of 
victims : the nation must be destroyed ; all w^ho 
had participated in the developement of thought 
and of science must perish, and none must be 
spared but the lowest rustics, whose intelhgence 
is scarcely superior to the beasts whose labours 
they share. Such was the object of the abbot 
Arnold, and he did not deceive himself as to the 
means of accomplishing it. 

Arnold Amalric, chief of the order of Citeaux, 
and legate of the pope, having assembled a 
council of the crusaders, required them to dis- 
pose of the conquests they had made in favour of 
a prince vdio would complete the extirpation of 
heresy ; and he offered at first the viscounties of 
Beziers and of Carcassonne to Eudes III, duke 
of Burgundy ; but he refused, saying, * that he 
had plenty of domains and lordships, without 
taking that, to disinherit the said viscount ; and 
that it appeared to him they had done him evil 
enough without despoihng him of his her- 
itage.' This noble refusal touched the hon- 
our of the other great lords. The count 
of Nevers, and the count of St. Paul, to 
whom the legate made the same propositions, 



A.D.1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 69 

held the same language. The abbot of Citeaux, 
to give more weiglit to his offers, associated with 
himself two bishops and four knights, and the 
council of the crusaders agreed that these seven 
commissioners should regulate the fate of the 
conquered countries. In their name, Arnold then 
offered these same sovereignties to Simon de 
Montfort, earl of Leicester. This lord of a 
castle, ten leagues from Paris, was the head of a 
house that had been illustrious for two hundred 
years, and which is traced by some to a natural son 
of king Robert.^ He had possessed the count- 
ship of Evreux, which, a few years since, he had 
sold to Philip Augustus ; and his mother, who 
was an English woman, had left him as an heri- 
tage the earldom of Leicester. He had disting- 
uished himself in the fourth crusade, from which 
he was recently returned. Skilful as a soldier, 
austere in his carriage, fanatical in his religion, 
cruel and perfidious, he united every quality which 
could please a monk. He was too ambitious to 
refuse the offer which was made him of elevating 
himself to the rank of the grand feudatories ; but 
he still thought himself obliged to feign a refusal, 
very sure that they would overcome this pretend- 
ed reluctance. He had, indeed, the pleasure of 
seeing the bishops throw themselves at his feet, 
to obtain his acceptance of what he the most 
desired.f 

* Prsefatio Camuratii Tricassini in Petrum Vallis Cern. Mon. 
Peter de Vaux Cernay, the historian of the crusade, was a Ber- 
nardin monk, or of the order of Citeaux ; his convent was situ- 
ated near to Montfort Amaury. He was vassal of his hero, Simon 
de Montfort, whom he followed to the crusade. 

t Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 19. Petri Vallis Cern. 
Hist. Albigens. cap. 17, p. 572. 



70 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

Simon de Montfort then took possession of the 
provinces which the legate offered him as a gift. 
He received the homage of those of the vassals 
of the two viscounties of Beziers and of Carcas- 
sonne, whom terror had brought to the camp of 
the crusaders, and who were eager, at this price, 
to make their peace with the church. He im- 
posed on his new states an annual rent, payable 
at the court of Rome, and he published rigorous 
ordinances against those of his subjects who 
should not anxiously endeavour to free them- 
selves from excommunication.* Yet the war was 
not terminated; many castles, even at the gates 
of Carcassonne, served as refuges to the heretics, 
whilst every day numeruos bands of crusaders, 
having finished the time of service for which they 
were engaged, abandoned the army. • The count 
of Nevers rejected all the solicitations of the le- 
gate, and departed precisely at the termination of 
his forty days. The count of Toulouse did the 
same. The duke of Burgundy consented to 
prolong the campaign a little, and assisted Simon 
de Montfort to take possession of Fanjeaux, Cas- 
tres, and Lombes, as well as at the attack upon 
the castle of Gabaret, from which the crusaders 
were repulsed witlf'loss ; but three days after this 
affair he returned to his own country. f 

Notwithstanding the departure of so many of 
the crusaders, there remained to Simon de Mont- 
fort soldiers enough to continue the war. Some 
came from his fiefs, or from those of his wife's fa- 

* Preuves de I'histoire de Languedoc, p. 213. 
t Petri Hist. Albigens. cap. xx, xxv, p. 574, et seq. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 71 

mily ; for about the year 1190 he had aUied him- 
self to a powerful house at the gates of Paris, by 
his marriage to Alice, daughter of Bouchard, of 
Montmorency. Others attached themselves to a 
skilful general, who promised them frequent oc- 
casions of pillage, and perhaps permanent estab- 
lishments in a conquered country. Many also 
were still influenced by that same fanaticism 
which had at first led them to the crusade. 
During the remainder of the campaign, Simon de 
Montfort directed their arms against the count of 
Foix, who, as well as the viscount of Carcas- 
sonne, was called Raymond Roger. This count 
must have been about fifty-five years of age ; he 
had reigned ever since 1188, and had accompa- 
nied Philip Augustus to the third crusade. He 
possessed the greater part of Albigeois, which 
was regarded as the seat of the new doctrines ; 
and he was himself accused of having secretly 
adopted them. In the first terror spread by the 
massacre at Beziers, the count of Foix dared not 
any longer continue the campaign ; he retired in- 
to the most inaccessible part of his states, whilst 
the catholic clergy of his principal cities rallied 
round Simon de Montfort. This last was receiv- 
ed without a combat into Pamiers and Albi. 
The castle of Mirepoix was also delivered to him, 
and Montfort bestowed it on Gui de Levis, his 
marshal, in whose posterity this fief has remained, 
with the title of count. The count of Foix, still 
troubled by a storm, which nevertheless began to 
abate from those countries, demanded to treat. 
Simon de Montfort, who perceived his real force 
diminish each day, and who never suffered his 



73 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

fanaticism to blind him as to his policy, accep- 
ted his propositions ; and during some weeks to- 
wards the end of the year 1209 the war appeared 
suspended on that frontier. * 

In the mean time, Simon de Montfort detained 
in prison the legitimate sovereign of the states, of 
which he had taken possession. He could per- 
ceive, even amongst his companions in arms, that 
pity towards this prince had already succeeded to 
fury. His neighbours loved him ; his people re- 
gretted him ; his relation and lord, the king of 
Aragon, might be disposed to resume his protec- 
tion. Simon de Montfort gave the necessary or- 
ders that Raymond Roger should die of a dysen- 
tery on the 10th of November, in a tower of the 
viscountal palace at Carcassonne, where he was 
carefully guarded. He then took care to display 
his body to his subjects, and to give him an hon- 
ourable funeral. Yet, by the public voice he was 
accused of having poisoned him, and even Inno- 
cent III acknowledged that he perished by a vio- 
lent death.f 

* Petrus Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xxv, p. 576. 

f Et morit, coma dit ^s, prisonier, done fouc bruyt per tota la 
terra, que lo dit conte de Montfort I'avia fait morir. — Historia de 
los faicts de Tolosa, p. 20. — Guillelmiis de Podio Laurentii, cap. 
xiv, p. 675. Innocentii III, Epist. Lib. xv, Ep. 212. — Hist, de 
Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. Ixxv, p. 183. 



CHAPTER II. 



[From A.D. 1209, to A.D. 1213.] 



Those whb had marched to the first crusade 
against the Albigenses, or who had made the 
campaign of 1209, regarded their obejct as com- 
pletely attained, and the war as terminated. In- 
deed, desolation had been carried into the bosom 
of the country where the reformation had com- 
menced. Two large cities had been destroyed, 
and thousands of victims had perished by the 
sword, whilst thousands of others, driven from 
their burning houses, were w^andering in the 
woods and mountains, and sinking each day un- 
der the pressure of want. Amongst the princes 
who had wished to maintain in their dominions a 
certain liberty of conscience, one had perished in 
prison, and had been replaced by the most piti- 
less of persecutors. Two others had submitted, 
and, to make their peace, refused not their tribute 
to the fires of the inquisition, so that, every day, 
the church celebrated the sacrifice of numerous 
human victims. 

The ruin of so fair a country, the contrast be- 
tween its former opulence and its present desola- 
tion, the remembrance of its fetes, of its tourna- 
ments, of the courts of love assembled in every 
castle, of the troubadours, the singers, the mins- 



74 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

trels, visiting by turns the lords and noble ladies, 
welcomed at their arrival, loaded with ^presents 
at their departure, and the sight of the fires for 
executions, of deserted villagesj of burning hous- 
es, would soon have caused the fury of war to 
have been succeeded by a deep-felt pity, if any 
other cause than religious fanaticism had armed 
the hands of the crusaders. 

Those who had committed so many crimes 
were not, for the greater part, bad men. They 
came from that part of Burgundy and northern 
France, where crimes have always been rare, 
where long contentions, hatred, and vengeance, 
are passions almost unknown — and where the un- 
happy are always sure to find compassion and aid. 
The crusaders themselves were always ready to 
alFord each other proofs of generosity, of sup- 
port, and compassion ; but the heretics were, in 
their eyes, outcasts from the human race. Ac- 
customed to confide their consciences to their 
priests, to hear the orders of Rome as a voice 
from heaven, never to submit that which apper- 
tained to the faith to the judgment of reason, 
they congratulated themselves on the horror they 
felt for the sectaries. The more zealous they 
were, for the glory of God, the more ardently 
they laboured for the destruction of heretics, the 
better Christians they thought themselves. And 
if at any time they felt a movement of pity or 
terror, whilst assisting at their punishment, they 
thought it a revolt of the flesh, which they con- 
fessed at the tribunal of penitence ; nor could 
they get quit of their remorse, till their priests 
had given them absolution. Woe to the men 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 75 

whose religion is completely perverted ! All 
their most virtuous sentiments lead them astray. 
Their zeal is changed into ferocity. Their hu- 
mility consigns them to the direction of tne im- 
postors who conduct them. Their very charity 
becomes sanguinary ; they sacrifice those from 
whom they fear contagion, and they demand 
a baptism of blood, to save some elect to the 
Lord. 

Besides, never had more energetic means been 
employed to confound the understanding, and 
corrupt the human heart. That is a very super- 
ficial and a very false judgment, w^iich con- 
demns whole nations for the crimes committed in 
their bosom. In proportion to the faithfulness of 
history, are the horrors with which it charges all 
great societies of men ; and if every thing were 
known, no nation would have much wherewith 
to reproach another. Let no one, then, pride it- 
self because all has not been told concerning it. 
As to the persecution of the Albigenses, it was 
not the work of the French alone. The Itahan, 
Innocent III, first gave the signal, and he also 
bestowed the recompence. He continually sharp- 
ened the sword of the murderers, by his legates 
and missionaries. The two Spaniards, the bishop 
of Ozma and Saint Dominic, (the founders of the 
inquisition) first taught the art of seeking out, in 
the villages, those whom the priests were after- 
wards to fasten to their stakes. The Germans, 
invited by their monks, came to take a part in 
tliis work, even from the extremities of Austria ; 
and the English Matthew Paris renders testimony 
to the zeal of his countrymen in the same cause, 



76 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

and to their triumphant joy at the miracle (for so 
he called the massacre of Beziers) which had aven- 
ged the Lord.* 

But if we are bound to absolve large masses of 
men from the attrocities committed, in the name 
of religion, against the Albigenses, it would be to 
destroy the only responsibility which rests upon 
the powerful, the only resort for the oppressed 
upon this earth, not to hold up to public execra- 
tion the fanatical monks who directed this move- 
ment, and the ambitious who profited by it. 
Amongst the first, the vengeance of public opin- 
ion ought not to rest only upon those who ac- 
companied the crusaders, in their expeditions, 
who dragged the reformers to the flames, and who 
mingled their songs of triumph with the groans of 
their miserable victims; these were, at least, 
blinded by the same mad passion with which they 
had inspired the combatants. There was some- 
thing m-ore personal, more deliberate, more coldly 
ferocious, in those clouds of monks who, issuing 
from all the convents of the order of Citeaux, 
spread themselves through the states of Europe, 
occupied all the pulpits, appealed to all the pas- 
sions to convert them into one, and showed how 
every vice might be expiated by crime, how re- 
morse might be expelled by the flames of their 
piles, how the soul polluted with every shameful 
passion, might become pure and spotless by bath- 
ing in the blood of heretics. After the conquest 
of the suspected country had been accomplished, 
after peace had been granted to the princes, and 

* Matth. Paris, Edit. Londin. p. 203. 



A.D. 1209.] THE ALBIGENSES. 77 

a safeguard to the submissive people, the monks 
of Citeaux continued, in every church, to preach 
a war of extermination, because they had done it 
with success in the preceding year, and because 
they were unwilhng to rehnquish the honours 
and profits of their ' mission. By continuing to 
preach the crusade, when there were none to com- 
bat, they impelled, each year, waves of new fa- 
natics upon these miserable provinces ; and they 
compelled their chiefs to recommence the war, in 
order to profit by the fervour of those who still 
demanded human victims, and required blood to 
effect their salvation. 

1209. After the departure of the crusaders, 
towards the end of the summer of 1209, the 
count Raymond VI of Toulouse thought himself 
on the point of being reconciled to the church, to 
which he had given sureties, and which he had 
served in the preceding campaign. The count 
of Foix had made his peace with Simon de Mont- 
fort, who was endeavouring to establish himself 
in the viscounties of Carcassonne and Beziers, at 
the same time that he was negociating with Don 
Pedro, king of Aragon, then at Montpellier, to 
prevail on him to receive his homage. The ani- 
val of new crusaders, conducted by Guy abbot of 
Vaux Cernay, of the order of Citeaux, inspired 
Simon de Montfort with fresh courage. On one 
hand, he thought it time to throw away the mxask 
'with Raymond VI count of Toulouse. He caus- 
ed him to be excommunicated by the two legates, 
and laid all his territory under an interdict, after 



78 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1209. 

which he began hostihties against him. * On the 
other hand, he caused the abbot of Eaulnes, who 
had made the peace between him and the count 
of Foix to be assassinated ; he then accused the 
count of this crime, and declared all negociation 
between them to be at an end.f Simon de 
Montfort was, hot^ever, too eager in attacking 
new enemies before he had entirely subjugated 
the old. The king of Aragon, after amusing him 
with long negociations, peremptorily refused his 
homage, and would acknowledge no other vis- 
count of Beziers and Carcassonne than Ray- 
mond Trencavel, son of the last viscount, two 
years of age, who was then under the care of the 
count of Foix. At the same time he solicited 
the knights, who held from these two viscounties, 
to take arms for the son of their lord, promising 
them powerful succours. Towards the end of 
November, they all revolted, almost at the same 
time. Many of the French, the creatures of Si- 
mon de Montfort, were surprised in the castles 
which they regarded as their conquest. Some 
became victims of the resentment excited in the 
country by the cruelties of the crusaders ; and at 
the end of the year, the domination of Simon de 
Montfort in Lansfuedoc was reduced to eio;ht cities 



* Innocentii III, lib, xii, Ep. 106, 107. Histaire de Langiie- 
doc, liv. xxi, cli. Ixviiij p. 178. 

I The knights of Toulouse, in a memorial addressed to the king 
of Aragon, accuse Simon and the crusaders of having given the 
best reception to the assassins of the abbot of Eaulnes:' Preuves 
de I'histoire de Languedoc, p. 2.S6. Peter de Vaux-Cernay, on the 
contrary, accuses the count of Foix of this assassination : cap. 
XXX, Hist. Albigens. p. 579. 



A.D. 1210.] THE ALBIGENSES. 79 

or castles, whilst it had at first comprised more 
than two hundred. * 

Raymond VI, count of Toulouse, would have 
been afraid of compromising himself still more 
wdth the court of Rome, if he had given any ap- 
pearance of exciting these revolts, or of making 
common cause with the enemies of Simon de 
Montfort. Although Montfort had already com- 
menced hostilities against him, he judged it more 
expedient to repair first to the court of Phihp 
Augustus, and afterwards to that of the pope, 
than to remain in his states, and defend them by 
open force. He arrived at Rome at the com- 
mencement of the year 1210, and addressed him- 
self to the pope to obtain his absolution. He 
w^as prepared to make great concessions, that he 
might avoid the fate of his nephew, the viscount 
of Beziers. He thought no longer of defending 
his heretical subjects ; it was sufficient for him to 
shelter himself from the ambition of Simon de 
Montfort, from the hatred of the the legate, Ar- 
nold abbot of Citeaux, and from the sanguinary 
fury of Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, who would 
have gladly seen the half of the flock, entrusted 
to his care, perish on the scaffold. 

1210. Innocent HI found himself, at that 
time, in one of those moments when he felt the 
power of the resistance he was called upon to 
conquer, and too much accustomed to despise. 
He had elevated himself to universal monarchy, 
and gave laws to the two empires of the east and 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 21, 22. Hist. Albigens. 
cap, xxvi, xxvii, p. 577. 



80 CHUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1210 

west. In that same year he scolded the king of 
Portugal, and encouraged the king of Castile ; he 
set himself as judge of the divorce of the king of 
Bohemia, and he incited the king of Denmark to 
take the cross. He had also just confirmed the 
rule which St. Francis d' Assise had given to the 
fraternity the most devoted to the holy see of all 
the orders of monks. * But, on the other hand^ 
the emperor Otho IV, whom he regarded as his 
creature, had just escaped from him, and incurred 
excommunication by his resistance to the holy 
see. John, the king of England, lived in open 
enmity with the church. Philip Augustus had 
dared to seize upon the temporalities of two 
bishops. A system of opposition to the pope 
appeared to be preparing in the Christian world, 
and in spite of all his pride. Innocent III was 
too politic not to temporize when occasion requir- 
ed, f 

Whether Innocent proposed only to separate 
Raymond from his partisans, to inspire him with 
a deceitful confidence, and to gain time, as the 
most zealous amongst the orthodox writers af- 
firm, X or whether he really felt good will towards 
the count of Toulouse, and was afterwards pre- 
vented from pardoning him by his legates, who 
deceived him, as some writers the most disposed 
to tolerance have supposed, || certain it is that he 
gave this prince a gracious reception. He re- 

* Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1210. § xxviii, p. 196. Lucas Wad^ 
ingus Ann. minor ad ann. 1210. 

t Guillelmus Armoricus, p. 84. 

^Petrus Vallis, Cern. Hist. Albigens cap. xxxiii, p. 580.. 

II Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 23. Histoire de Langue- 
doc, liv. xxj, ch. Ixxxi, p. 187. 



A.D. 1210.] THE ALBIGENSES. 81 

leased him, provisionally, from the excommuni- 
cation pronounced against him, but referred him, 
for final absolution, to a council which should 
assemble in the province three months after the 
count's return. The purpose of this council was 
only to judge whether Raymond was, or was 
not, guilty of heresy, and whether he had, or 
had not, prompted the murderer of the legate 
Peter of Castelnau. These were the two accu- 
sations w4iich exposed the count to the severest 
penalties ; but, on the other hand, they were 
those respecting which he felt himself the most 
innocent, and of which he was the most eager to 
purge himself.* 

1210. But the legate Arnold, abbot of Ci- 
teaux, joined to the ambitious zeal of the pope 
an implacable hatred against count Raymond. 
He had summoned the council, to which Innocent 
III had referred the cause of the count, to meet 
at Saint Gilles, but, before its assembling, new 
successes of Simon de Montfort against the lords 
of the castles, who still defended either the in- 
dependence of their jurisdiction or that of their 
conscience, and new judicial massacres, had in- 
spired him with more confidence in the cause 
which he wished to see triumphant. Master 
Theodise, a canon of Genoa, whom the pope 
had sent to advise with the legate, had a secret 
conference with him at Toulouse. '^ He was," 
says Peter de Vaux-Cernay, a circumspect man, 
prudent and very zealous for the affairs of God, 
and he desired above all things to find some pre- 

* Innocentii III Epistolae, lib. xii, 152. 169. 

5 



82 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1210. 

text of right to refuse the count that opportunity 
of justifying himself which Innocent had granted 
him."* He agreed, at last, with the abbot of 
Citeaux and the bishop of Riez, that he should 
seek some cause of dispute with the count, re- 
specting the accomplishment of some subordinate 
conditions which the pope had enjoined upon 
him, founding himself upon the words of ttie 
bull of Innocent III — We desire that he execute 
our orders.'f 

When, in fact, Raymond VI presented himself 
to the council of St. Gilles, to justify himself, 
and, offered to establish, by indubitable proofs, 
that he had never participated in heresy, and was 
a stranger to the murder of the legate, Peter of 
Castelnau, Master Theodise stopped him, by 
declaring that he had not yet destroyed all the 
heretics of the county of Toulouse ; that he had 
not yet suppressed all the tolls, whose abolition 
was demanded by the pope ; that he had not yet 
abolished or restored all the collections, which 
his officers had made upon different convents ; 
and since he had disobeyed the orders of the 
church in smaller matters, they might conclude 
that he would, the more certainly, have disobey- 
ed in the two crimes of which he was accused. 
Thus, the council, to prevent perjury either in 
himself or his witnesses, refused him the permis- 
sion to clear himself of these two capital accu- 
sations. When the count, who thought himself 
fully assured that this day would establish his 

*Hist. Albigen.cap. xxxix, p. 585. 

f Petri Vallis Cera. cap. xxxix, p. 585. Concilia generalia, t. 
xi, p. 54. 



A.D. 1210.] THE ALBIGENSES. 83 

innocfence, heard this unexpected declaration, he 
burst into tears. But Master Theodise remem- 
bered a passage of holy Scripture, by which to 
free himself from feehngs of humanity. How 
great soever be the overflow of waters, said he, 
turning his tears into derision, they will not reach 
unto God; and he fulminated, in the name of 
the churcli, an excommunication against the count 
of Toulouse.* The council of St. Gilles did 
not assemble till the end of September, and its 
rigor augmented in proportion to the success ob- 
tained by Simon de Montfort in the course of 
this same campaign. During the winter, Mont- 
fort had been reduced to stand upon the defens- 
ive, and revolts in every part of the province had 
sufficiently proved to him how much his yoke 
was detested. But the monks of Citeaux had 
recommenced the preaching of the crusade in 
the north of France. There was, said they to 
those ferocious and superstitious warriors, no 
crime so dark, no vice so deeply rooted in the 
heart, the very trace of which, a campaign of 
forty days, in the south of France, would not 
obliterate. Paradise, with all its glories, was 
opened for them, without the necessity of pur- 
chasing it by any reformation in their conduct. 
Alice of Montmorency, Simon de Montfort's 
wife, undertook the direction of the first army of 
crusaders, raised by the monks. At the begin- 
ning of Lent, her husband came to meet her at 
Pezenas, and no sooner found himself at the head 

* Psrtlin XXXI, v,8. Petri Val. Cein. cap. XXXIX, 586. His- 
toire de Lauguedoc, liv. xxi, p. 197, et note xvi, p. 561. 



84 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1210. 

of an imposing force, than he gave full scope to 
his cruelty.* 

He attacked, in the first place, the castle of 
Lauraguais and Minervois. The feudal state of 
independence had multiplied these fortresses, and 
the smallest province was covered with citadels. 
They did not all however appear to their pos- 
sessors capable of sustaining a siege ; the terror 
which the crusaders inspired caused a great num- 
ber to be abandoned. Simon de Montfort gen- 
erally caused all their inhabitants, whom he could 
lay hands upon, to be hanged upon gibbets. 
Some castles, calculating too favorably upon their 
strength, endeavored to resist him ; that of Brora 
was taken by assault the third day of the siege, 
and Simon de Montfort chose out more than a 
hundred of its wretched inhabitants, and having 
torn out their eyes, and cut of their noses, sent 
them, in that state, under the guidance of a one- 
eyed man, to the castle of Cabaret, to announce 
to the garrison of that fortress the fate which 
awaited them. The castle of Alairac was not 
taken till the eleventh day, and even then a great 
part of its inhabitants were able to escape from 
the ferocity of the crusaders. Montfort massacred 
the remainder. Farther on he found castles 
abandoned and absolutely empty ; and, not being 
able to reach the men, he sent out his soldiers to 
destroy the surrounding vines and olive-trees. f 

1210. Montfort afterwards conducted his army 

*Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxi, ch. Ixxxiv, p. 191. 

+ Petri Vallis Cernai Histor. Albigens. cap. xxxiv, xxxv, p. 

5S1, 582. 



A.D 1210 ] THE ALBIGENSES. 85 

to a more important siege, that of the castle of 
Minerva, situated at a small distance from Nar- 
bonne, on a steep rock, surrounded by precipices, 
and regarded as the strongest place in the Gauls. 
This castle belonged to Guiraud of Minerva, vas- 
sal of the viscounts of Carcassonne, and one of 
the bravest knights of the province. The army 
of the crusaders appeared before Minerva, at the 
beginning of June ; the legate Arnold, and the 
canon Theodise, joined it soon after. The in- 
habitants, among whom were many who had em- 
braced the reform of the Albigenses, defended 
themselves with great valor for seven weeks; 
but, w^hen, on account of the heats of summer, 
the water began to fail in their cisterns, they de- 
manded a capitulation. Guiraud came himself 
to the camp of the crusaders, one day when the 
legate was absent, and agreed with Simon de 
Montfort on conditions for the surrender of the 
place. But, as they were proceeding to execute 
them, the abbot Arnold returned to the camp, 
and Montfort immediately declared that nothing 
which they had agreed upon could be considered 
as binding, till the legate had given his assent. 
" At these words," says Peter de Vaux-Cernay, 
"the abbot was greatly afflicted. In fact, he 
desired that all the enemies of Christ should be 
put to death, but he could not take upon himself 
to condemn them, on account of his quality of 
monk and priest." He thought, however, that 
he might stir up some quarrel between the nego- 
dation, profit by it to break the capitulation, and 
cause all the inhabitants to be put to the sword. 
For this purpose, he required the count on one 



86 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1210. 

part, and Guiraud of Minerva on the other, to 
put into writing, without communicating with 
each other, the conditions on which they had 
aoreed. As Arnold had flattered himself, he 
found some difference in the statements, and 
Montfort immediately availed himself of it, to 
declare in the name of the legate, that the nego- 
ciation was broken off. But the lord of Minerva 
instantly replied, that, though he thought himself 
sure of his memory, yet he accepted the capitu- 
lation as Simom de Montfort had drawn it up. 
One of the articles of this capitulation provided, 
that the heretics themselves, if they were con- 
verted, might quit the castle, and have their hves 
saved. Vfhen the capitulation was read in the 
council of war, " Robert of Mauvoisin," says 
the monk of Vaux-Cernay, '^ a nobleman, and 
entirely devoted to the catholic faith, cried, that 
the pilgrims would never consent to that ; that 
it was not to shew mercy to the heretics, but to 
put them to death, they had taken the cross ; but 
the abbot Arnold replied — fear not, for I believe 
there will be very few converted." The legate 
was not deceived in this bloody hope. The cru- 
saders took possession of the castle of Minerva 
the 22nd of July, 1210 ; they entered, singing 
Te Deum, and preceded by the cross and the 
standards of Montfort. The heretics were, in 
the mean time, assembled, the men in one house, 
the women in another, and there, on their knees, 
and resigned to their fate, they prepared them- 
selves, by prayer, for the punishment which 
awaited them. The abbot, Guy de Vaux-Cer- 
nay, to fulfil the capitulation, came, and began 



A.D. 1210.] THE ALBIGENSES. 87 

to preach to them the cathohc faith ; but his 
auditors interrupted him by ah unanimous cry — 
" We will have none of your faith, said they, 
'•' we have renounced the church of Rome : your 
labor is in vain ; for neither death nor life will 
make us renounce the opinions that we have 
embraced." The abbot of Vaux-Cernay then 
passed to the assembly of the women, but he found 
them as resolute, and more enthusiastic still in their 
declarations. The count of Montfort, in his turn, 
visited both. Already he had piledup an enor- 
mous mass of dry wood : " Be converted 
to the catholic faith,^' said he to the as- 
sembled Albigenses, '' or ascend this pile.'^ — 
None were shaken. They set fire to the pile, 
which covered the whole square with a tremen- 
dous conflagration ; and the heretics were then 
conducted to the place. But violence was not 
necessary to compel them to enter the flames ; 
they voluntarily precipitated themselves into 
them, to the number of more than one hundred 
and forty, after having commended their souls to 
tliat God, in whose cause they suffered martyr- 
dom. Three women only, forcibly retained by 
the noble dame of Marly, mother of Bouchard, 
lordofMontmorenci, were saved from the flames; 
and terror and consternation succeeding to their 
enthusiastic fervor, they consented to be con- 
verted.* 



* Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xxxvii, p. 583, 584. 
We owe to this historian, monk of Vaux-Cernay, the adrairer of 
his abbot Guy, and of his lord Simon de Montfort,who accompanied 
both in the crusade, all the detail of the circumstances ; but they 
arc confirmed in a more summary manner by the Historia de log 
clara de Tolosa, p. 25. — Chron. Guill. de Nangis, p. 490. — Prae- 
faicts Francorum Facinora, p. 765. — Bernardi Guidonis Vita 



88 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1210. 

The capture of Minerva was quickly followed 
by the siege of the castle of Termes, upon the 
frontiers of Roussilon. This castle was extreme- 
ly strong, and commanded by a valiant captain, 
Raymond of Termes. He made a long resist- 
ance, and tired the patience of the crusaders, who 
would willingly have granted an advantageous 
capitulation. As the pilgrims after a service of 
forty days, which was sufficient to obtain the in- 
dulgences, quitted the army, Simon de Montfort 
found himself, on many occasions, left with so 
small a force, that he was on the point of raising 
the siege. But all the provinces of the Gauls, 
excited by the same fanaticism, sent, in their 
turns, contingents to the sacred war. After the 
arrival of the bishops of Chartres and Beruvais, 
who had conducted thither the inhabitants of 
Orleanais, and the ifele of France, and the counts 
of Dreux and Ponthieu followed by their vassals, 
there came in succession, Bretons, Germans, and 
Lorrains. The strength of the besieged sunk at 
last, after four months' combats, under so many 
repeated attacks, and so much the more, as hav- 
ing filled their cisterns a second time from the 
rains which fell during the great heats, numerous 
dysenteries, from that cause, prevailed amongst 
them. During the night between the 22nd and 
23rd of November, they attempted to escape by 
abandoning the place. They did, indeed, pass 
the first entrenchments, and dispersed themselves 
in the mountains, with the hope of reaching 

InnoGendi III Script. Ital. t. iii. p, 4^1, — Hist. gen. deLaogue- 
doc, liv. xxi, p. 193, 194. 



A.D. 1210.] THE ALBIGENSES. 89 

Catalonia; but the moment their flight was per- 
ceived, a general cry arose in the army. The 
crusaders exhorted each other not to let those, who 
had cost them so much sweat and blood, escape 
from punishment. The w^hole body of the pilgrims 
followed the fugitives, the greater part of whom 
were overtaken, and killed on the spot ; others 
were conducted alive to Simon de Montfort. Of 
these, he spared Raymond, lord of Termes, and, 
instead of burning him, confined him at the bottom 
of a tower in Carcassonne, where he suffered him 
to languish for many years.* 

The taking of two such strong places as Min- 
erva and Termes made all the garrisons of the 
neighboring castles lose their courage : they dar- 
ed no longer trust to their walls, and the army 
advancing into the Albigeois to the left of the 
Tarn found all the places deserted. By this 
means they occupied the castles of Constasse, of 
Puyvert, of Lombers, and a great number of 
others ; but the miserable inhabitants were not 
able to save themselves by flight. They were 
followed into the woods and mountains ; the 
greater part perished there by the sword, and 
those that were brought prisoners to the camp 
were burned for the edification of the army.f 

Whatever care the legates had taken, to pre- 
vent the count of Toulouse from justifying him- 
self. Innocent III had not yet confirmed the sen- 
tence of excommunication, which had been new- 
ly fulminated against him. So powerful a feuda- 

* Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albi^ens. cap. xlii, p. 590, 591. 
t Hist. Albig. cap. xlii, p. 592. Historia de los faicts de Tolo- 
sa, p. 29. Bernardi Guidonis Vita Innocentii 111, p. 482. 



90 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1211. 

toiy required to be treated with greater caution 
than had been used towards the inferior lords, 
v/ho w^ere, hke him, accused of favoring- the her- 
etics. Phihp Augustus had written to the pope 
to recommend him to his indulgence. Don Pe- 
dro, king of Aragon, who had long since given 
his sister in marriage to Raymond VI, and had 
afterwards promised his ov/n daughter to his son, 
having lost that daughter at an early age, had 
married, in the beginning of the year 1211, an- 
other of his sisters, also named Sancha, to the 
young Raymond VII, and thus strengthened still 
more the alliance which united him to this house.* 
Simon de Montfort, whose fanaticism never pre- 
vented him from managing his temporal interests 
like a w^ily pohtician, undertook to deprive the 
count of Toulouse of the support which he found 
in Spain, and, for this purpose, carefully sought 
to gain the friendship of the king of Aragon. 
Pedro thought perhaps that by reconcihng him- 
self with Montfort, he might afterwards the more 
easily serve his two brothers-in-law. He began, 
therefore, by receiving his homage for the two 
viscounties of Carcassonne, and of Beziers : af- 
terwards he consented, by a strange and inex- 
plicable arrangement, not only to betroth his son 
Don Jayme or James, to a daughter of Montfort, 
but to commit his only son, then three years of 
age, to that lord whom he disliked and distrusted. 
When Don Pedro took, in the beginning of the 
year 1211, this strange resolution, he was impell- 

* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xviii, p. 677. Note 35 
rHistoirede Languedoc,p. 591. 



A.D. 1211.] THE ALBIGENSES. 91 

ed perhaps by one of those fits of devotion which 
in that age deranged all the calculations of poli- 
cy; perhaps, he feared, for his French provinces, 
the attacks of those swarms of crusaders, whom 
he saw every year arrive, and w^as willing at any 
price, to ensure the friendship of their chief.* 

1211. But neither the manoeuvres of Mont- 
fort, with regard to the count of Toulouse, nor 
his alliance with the king of Aragon, was of lono- 
duration. Informed that the preachers of the 
crusade, instead of growing cool, were inflamed 
by his last success, and that the crusaders wdio 
would join him, during the year, would be more 
numerous than those of the years preceding, he 
prepared to second the hatred of the abbot of 
Citeaux and the bishop Fouquet against the count 
of Toulouse, in the hope of joining the fine 
sovereignty of that prince to his former conquests. 
He wished, however, to profit to the last by the 
weakness of Raymond, and by his desire to be 
reconciled to the church, and he awaited the 
result of a citation of the legates, who had sum- 
moned him to appear, about the middle of Feb- 
ruary, before a provincial council, which they 
were assembling at Aries. Count Raymond and 
the king of Aragon attended there together, and 
were no sooner entered into the city, than they 
received orders not to quit it without the permis- 
sion of the council. A note containing thirteen 
articles was afterwards communicated to them, 
on the reception and execution of which, the 
fathers of the church announced that they would 

*Hist. de Laoguedoc, liv. xxi, ch. xcvi, p. 203. 



92 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1211. 

restore to the count of Toulouse, all his territo- 
ries and lordships, when it should please the count 
of Montfort and the legate. Never was a more 
adsurd and insulting treaty proposed to a sove- 
reign prince, who was still in full possession of 
his states. Raymond VI was required to dismiss 
all the soldiers armed for his defence ; to rase 
all his fortifications ; to exclude from the strong 
cities of his dominions all the knights who might 
serve for their defence ; to renounce all the cus- 
toms w^hich formed the greater part of his reve- 
nue ; to reduce all the inhabitants of his states, 
both nobles and plebeians, to wear the dress of 
penitence, and submit to an abstinence almost 
monastics! ; to deliver to Simon de Montfort and 
the legate, at the first demand, all those of their 
subjects whom they should require, that they 
might burn them according to their good pleas- 
ure ; in fine, to proceed himself to the Holy 
Land, to «erve amongst the hospitallers of Saint 
John of Jerusalem, until he was recalled by the 
legate.* The indignation and surprise of count 
Raymond and the king of Aragon, at reading 
these demands, was proportionable to their inso- 
lence. They had been prohibited from quitting 
Aries, but no precautions had been taken for 
retaining them in that city. They instantly set 
out, without taking leave of the bishops, who 
throwing off all disguise towards the count of 
Toulouse, excommunicated him afresh, declared 
him an enemy to the church, and an apostate from 

* Historia de los faicta de Tolosa, p. 30 et suiv. Histoire de 
Languedoc, liv. xxi,ch. xcviii, p. 204. 



A.D. 1211.] THE ALBIGENSES. 93 

the faith, and abandoned his domains to the first 
occupant.* 

We may be assured that these churchmen, 
when they shewed themselves so arrogant and 
pitiless, were sensible of the augmentation of their 
forces. In fact, the fanatic Fouquet, bishop of 
Toulouse, had been preaching the crusade in 
France with great success. It was at Toulouse, 
especially, that he wished to kindle the flames ; it 
was in the flock which God had confided to him 
that he wished, he said, to separate the sheep 
from the goats. Many of those who attended on 
his ministry, who conformed to all the laws of the 
church, appeared to him either too lukewarm in 
their zeal, or suspicious in their faith, and he 
wished to purify them by fire. He succeeded in 
causing the bishop of Paris, Robert de Courte- 
nay, count of Auxerre, Enguerrand de Coucy, 
Joel de Mayenne, and a great number of other 
French barons and knights, to take the cross a- 
gainst the Albigenses. These, in the course of the 
same campaign, were followed by Leopold duke of 
Austria, Adolphus count of Mons, and William 
count of Juliers. f The Holy Land was nearly 
abandoned by the western knights, since they 
could gain the same indulgences by these, as it 
were, domestic crusades. About the 10th of 
March, Simon de Montfort found himself at the 
head of a very large army, with which he opened 
the campaign. 

His first attack was directed against the castle 

* Acta Concilii Vauriens. in tomo 2 Epistolte Iimocentii III, 
Edit. Baluzii,p. 762. 

t Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. xlviii, p. 596. — Caesar 
Heisterbachiensis, lib. v, cap. xxi. 



94 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1211. 

of Cabaret, which had hitherto braved all the 
threats of the crusaders ; but long reverses had 
broken the spirit of the Albigenses. Peter Rog- 
er, lord of Cabaret, submitted voluntarily to 
Montfort, and opened to him the gates of his 
fortress. His example was followed by the lords 
of many other castles, in the mountains which 
separate the diocese of Carcassonne from that of 
Toulouse. It seemed to be the design of Mont- 
fort to open to himself these passages, by treating 
the places with a humanity which he rarely ex- 
ercised. The crusaders then advanced as far as 
Lavaur on the Agoiit, five leagues from Toulouse. 
Lavaur, which v/as afterwards raised to the rank 
of an episcopal city, was then only a strong cas- 
tle. It belonged to a widov/ named Guiraude, 
whom her brother, Aimery de Montreal, had join- 
ed with eighty knights, after having been despoil- 
ed by the crusaders of his own fiefs. Aimery 
and Guiraude, as well as many of their defend- 
ers, professed the reform of the Albigenses. 
They had opened an asylum, within their walls, 
to those of the reformed who were persecuted in 
the other parts of the province ; so that their 
fortress, which was vrell stored with provisions, 
surrounded with strong walls, and girded with 
deep ditches, was considered as one of the prin- 
cipal seats of heresy. This consideration pre- 
vented count Raymond, who still courted the 
church, from openly sending them assistance ; but, 
he is accused of having caused his seneschal to 
enter it secretly with a body of knights. During 
this time, Fouquet returning to Toulouse had 
had communicated his fanaticism to a part of the 



A.D. 1211,] THE ALBIGENSES. 95 

inhabitants of that city. He told them that their, 
mixture with the heretics rendered them an ob- 
ject of horror to all Christians; and, that they might 
not be confounded with them, they should be the 
first to arm themselves against those of their fel- 
low-citizens who had abandoned the cathohc 
faith. He had enrolled them into a society 
which named itself, the White Company, and 
engaged to destroy the heretics by fire and sword. 
Having thus inflamed their zeal, he ,sent five 
thousand of these fanatics to the siege of La- 
vaur. * 

Whilst this siege v>'as going on, count Raymond 
made one more attempt at reconciliation with the 
legate and Simon de Montfort ; but ah his offers 
having been rejected, he saw, at last, that a more 
vigorous conduct was his only resource : and upon 
this he ouorht doubtless, lono; since to have deter- 
mined, if so much resolution had belonged to his 
character. He formed a close alliance with the 
counts of Cominges, and of Foix ; with Gaston, 
viscount of Beam ; Savary de Mauleon, seneschal 
of Aquitaine, and the other lords of those prov- 
inces, who were accused of tolerance or of here- 
sy, and whose interests w^ere become one with 
his own. These lords, informed that the German 
body of crusaders, from the duke of Austria, and 
the counts of Mons and Juliers, had advanced as 
far as Montjoyre, between the Tarn and the Gar- 
ronne, and that it was marching to the siege of 
Lavaur, six thousand strong, detached a chosen 

* Petri Val. Cern. Hist, Albigens. cap. xHx, 1, p. 596, 597, 
Guil. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xvi, xvii, p. 676. 



96 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1211. 

body of troops, under the command of the count 
of Foix, of his son, and of Guiraud de Pepieux, 
who laid an ambush for the Germans, and cut 
them in pieces before Simon de Montfort could 
come to their assistance. On the other side, count 
Raymond had prohibited all his subjects from 
carrying provisions to the camp of the crusaders, 
who were thereby reduced to great extremities. 
But they were commanded by a chief, as much 
superior to the other captains by his skill and 
prudence, as he outdid the rest of the fanatics by 
his cold ferocity. Simon de Montfort had profit- 
ed by all the progress which the art of war had 
made in that age. He had himself served in the 
Holy Land, and there were in his camp a great 
number of knights who had combated against the 
Turks and the Greeks, and who had, in the East, 
acquired the knowledge of the attack and defence 
of fortified places. He employed, therefore, to 
overthrow the walls, ingenious machines, whose 
introduction was quite recent amongst the Latins, 
and which were as yet unknown to the inhabitants 
of the Pyrenees. 

The most fearful was that which was called 
the cat. A moveable wooden tower, strongly 
constructed, was built out of the reach of the be- 
sieged. When it was entirely covered with 
sheepskins, with the fur outwards to guard it from 
fire, and provided with soldiers at its openings, 
and on the platform at its summit, it was moved 
on rollers to the foot of the wall. Its side then 
opened, and an immense beam, armed with iron 
hooks, projected like the paw of a cat, shook the 
wall by reiterated strokes, after .the manner of the 



A.D. 1211.] THE ALBIGENSES. 97 

ancient battering ram, and tore out, and pulled 
down, the stones which it had loosened. Simon 
de Montfort had constructed a cat, but the wide 
ditches of Lavaur prevented him from bringing it 
near enough to the walls. The crusaders, under 
the orders of Montfort, laboured unceasingly to 
fill up the ditch, whilst the inhabitants of Lavaur, 
who could descend into it by subterranean pas- 
sages, cleared away each night all that had been 
thrown in during the day. At last Montfort suc- 
ceeded in filling the mines with flame and smoke, 
and thereby prevented the inhabitants from pass- 
sing into them. The ditches were then speedily 
filled ; the cat was pushed to the foot of the wall ; 
and its terrible paw began to open and enlarge the 
breach. 

On the day of the finding of the holy cross, 
the 3rd of May, 1211, Montfort judged the 
breach to be practicable. The crusaders prepar- 
ed for the assault. The bishops, the abbot of 
Courdieu, who exercised the functions of vice- 
legate, and all the priests clothed with their pon- 
tifical habits, giving themselves up to the joy of 
seeing the carnage begin, sang the hymn Veni 
Creator. The knights mounted the breach. 
Resistance was impossible ; and the only care of 
Simon de Montfort was to prevent the crusaders 
from instantly falling upon the inhabitants, and to 
beseech them rather to make prisoners, that the 
priests of the Hving God might not be deprived of 
their promised joys. ^ Very soon,' continues the 
monk of Vaux-Cernay, ' they dragged out of the 
castle Aimery, lord of Montreal, and other knights 
to the number of eighty. The noble count im- 
6 



98 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1211. 

mediately ordered them to be hanged upon the 
gallows ; but, as soon as Aimery, the stoughtest 
among them, was hanged, the gallows fell ; for, 
in their great haste, they had not well fixed it in 
the earth. The count, seeing that this w^ould 
produce great delay, ordered the rest to be mas- 
sacred ; and the pilgrims, receiving the order with 
the greatest avidity, very soon massacred them 
all upon the spot. The lady of the castle, who 
was sister of Aimery, and an execrable heretic, 
was, by the count's order, thrown into a pit, which 
was filled up with stones ; afterwards, our pilgrims 
collected the innumerable heretics that the castle 
contained, and burned them alive with the utmost 

joy ' * 

Open hostihties had not yet commenced be- 
tween Simon de Montfort and the count of Tou- 
louse, but they followed immediately on the tak- 
ing of Lavaur. The refusal to send provisions to 
the besiegers might serve as a pretext, but none 
was wanted for attacking those who were excom- 
municated. The castle of Montjoyre was the 
first place immediately belonging to the count of 
Toulouse, before which the crusaders presented 
themselves ; and being abandoned, it was burned 
and rased from top to bottom by the soldiers of 
the church. The castle of Cassero afforded 
them more satisfaction, as it furnished human 
victims for their sacrifices. It was surrendered 
on capitulation ; and the pilgrims seizing nearly 



* Cum ingenti gaudio. Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. c. lii. 
p. 598, 599.— Bernardi Guidonis Vita Innocentii III, p. 482. 
This last informs us that 400 heretics were burnt at Lavaur. 
Guil. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xvii p. 676. 



A.D. 1211.] THE ALBIGENSES, 99 

sixty heretics burned them with infinite joy. 
This is always the phrase employed by the monk, 
who was the witness and panegyrist of the cru- 
sade. A great number of castles were afterwards 
either surrendered to the crusaders or abandoned ; 
and these crusaders finding themselves, about 
the middle of June, reinforced by a new army 
from Germany, undertook the siege of Tou- 
louse. * 

This city was very far from having been con- 
verted to the reformation of the Albigenses ; the 
catholics still formed the greater number. But 
their consuls refused either to renounce their fidel- 
ity to their count, though ne had been excom 
municated, or to deliver up to punishment those 
of their citizens who were suspected of inclining 
towards the new opinions. The bishop Fouquet 
had succeeded in forming in the city an associa- 
tion, named the white company, who engaged to 
pursue the heretics unto death. This company, 
by its own authority, erected a tribunal, before 
which it carried those whose faith it suspected, 
with those whose conduct it accused, or against 
whom it alleged usurious loans. It afterwards 
executed its own judgment by open force, by the 
destruction and pillage of their houses. The par- 
tisans of tolerance very soon formed a counter as- 
sociation, which they called the black company ; 
the two troops frequently came to arms in the 
streets, with ensigns displayed ; and many towers, 
which belonged to one side or the other, were 

*Petn Val. Cern. Hjst. Albigens. cap. ]iii, p. 600. Cbron. 
Guill. de Podjo Law. cap. xviii,p. 676. 



100 CRUSADES AGAINST [ A.D. 1211. 

alternately besieged. ' Thus,' continues master 
William Puylaurens, (a contemporary historian,) 
' did our Lord, by the ministry of his servant the 
bishop, instead of a bad peace, excite amongst 
them a good war.' * 

But, whilst the bishop was endeavouring to 
kindle war amongst his flock, the count was la- 
bouring to restore peace amongst his subjects. 
At the return of the five thousand men of the 
white company, who had been at the siege of 
Lavaur, he represented to them that their dissen- 
sions would bring ruin on their country ; that an 
attack of the crusaders would involve them all in 
one common destruction ; and that, whatever 
might be their differences of opinion, they ought 
to repair their walls, and prepare for their defence, 
if they would not expose themselves to the haz- 
ard of being put to the sword. He succeeded in 
producing a reconciliation between the two com- 
panies, and the legate took occasion from it to 
subject all the Toulousians to a sentence of ex- 
communication, t On his part the bishop Fou- 
quet recalled his clergy; that he might save his 
priests from that punishment to which he des- 
tined the remainder of his flock. All the priests 
of Toulouse, with the provost of the cathedral at 
their head, quitted the city, barefoot, carrying the 
holy sacrament in the procession, and singing lit- 
anies. However, the Toulousians did not at that 
time suffer the fate to which their pastors destined 
them. Raymond VI, seconded by the counts 

* Chronica Magistri Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, c xv, p. 
675. 

t Guillelmi de Podio Laur, cap. xviii, p. 677 



A.D. 1211.] THE ALBIGENSES. 101 

of Foix and of Cominges, so incommoded the be- 
siegers, by frequent sallies, killed so many of 
them, and made them so soon endure privations 
aiid famine, that Simon de Montfort was obliged 
to raise the siege on the 29th of June, and soon 
after saw himself abandoned by the greater part 
of the crusaders, whose time of service had ex- 
pired. * 

To efface the remembrance of this check, Si- 
mon de Montfort extended his ravages into the 
county of Foix, which he desolated with fire 
and slaughter. He then passed into Quercy, the 
lordship of which he compelled the inhabitants to 
give him. But at the same time the count of 
Toulouse, having collected succours from all his 
alhes, came in his turn to besiege Castelnaudary. 
He appeared before that city towards the end of 
September, with the counts of Foix and of 
Gominges, the viscovrnt of Beam, and Savary de 
Mauleon. Although the crusaders were reduced 
to an inferiority of number, Simon de Montfort 
did not abandon the besieged. He shut himself 
up in their walls, with a chosen troop of his old 
companions in arms, who did not exceed one 
hundred knights. At the same time he solicited 
his heutenants, his vassals, and his wife, to collect 
all the soldiers who were at their disposal, and 
march to his deliverance ; but as soon as his for- 
tune began to waver, the hatred, that he had ex- 
cited through the country, broke out in every 

* Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. liv, Iv, p. 600, 601. 
Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 38. Lettre des habitans de 
Toulouse a Pierre roi d' Aragon. Preures de I'histoire de Lan- 
guedoc, p, 232 et seq. 



102 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1211. 

part, and those, upon whom he had reckoned the 
most, declared against him. His mareschal Guy 
de Levis, and his brother-in-law, Bouchard de 
Marh, or Montmorency, succeeded, at last, in 
collecting a numerous body of knights, from the 
dioceses of Narbonne, Carcassonne, and Beziers. 
These were crusaders, who, like Montfort, had 
gained establishments in the country, and who 
saw, that, without an effort of valour, their con- 
quests would be lost. The valiant count of Foix 
intercepted them about a league from Castelnau- 
dary, attacked and dispersed them two several 
times, but his troops having broken their ranks, 
to pillage the vanquished, were attacked anew 
either by another body of the crusaders, or by 
Montfort himself, who at the head of sixty knights 
had sallied from Castelnaudary, and were in their 
turn, put to the rout. In spite of this success, in 
spite of the arrival of Alain de Rouci a French 
knight, with a fresh body of crusaders, the aifaii's 
of Simon de Montfort continued to decline to the 
end of the year. The count of Toulouse re- 
conquered all the strong places of Albigeois, and, 
in more than fifty castles, the inhabitants 
eagerly expelled or massacred their French gar- 
risons, to surrender themselves to their ancient 
lord. * 

The hatred against the crusaders which seem- 
ed rooted in the hearts of all the inhabitants of 
the country, and of all who spoke the proven^al 

* Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albig. c. Ivi, Ivii, Iviii, p. 604 et seq. 
Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xix, p. 677. Historia de los faicts 
de Tolosa, p. 42 et seq. Hist, gen de Languedoc, liv. xxiij chap, 
viii, ix, X, p. 21S et seq. 



A.D. 1212.] THE ALBIGENSES. 103 

language, gave occasion to the legates, the vice- 
legates, the monks of Citeaux, and to all that ec- 
clesiastical council which hitherto had directed the 
crusade, to announce that it was time to complete 
the regeneration of the country, by changing the 
secular clergy. They had long accused the bish- 
ops of lukewarmness, or indifference to the tri- 
umphs of the church, and had solicited their dep- 
osition. This they at last obtained, in the year 
1212, either from the pope, or from the timidity 
of the persecuted prelates themselves. Bernard 
Raymond de Rochefort, bishop of Carcassonne, 
consented to give in his resignation ; and Guy, 
abbot of Vaux-Cernay, was invested with his 
bishopric. It is not known whether Berenger, 
archbishop of Narbonne, escaped by death from 
the persecutions which he had so long suffered, 
or whether he was deposed ; but Arnold Amal- 
ric, abbot of Citeaux, and chief of all the lega- 
tions to the Albigenses, took possession of this 
archbishopric. Amongst the bishops of his prov- 
ince, who assisted at his consecration, two others 
were taken from that order of Citeaux, which had 
preached and conducted the crusade. The ab- 
bot Arnold did not, however, content himself with 
the spiritual dignity which he acquired, as the 
fruit of his labours for the extirpation of heresy. 
To the archiepiscopal throne of Narbonne, and 
to the rich revenues of that metropolitan see, he 
resolved also to jodn the ducal crown. The count 
of Toulouse bore, at the same time, the title of 
duke of Narbonne, and the viscount of that same 
city was his vassal, and owed him homage. The 
abbot Arnold in excommunicating Raymond VI, 



104 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1212. 

had abandoned his states to the first occupant, 
and he had taken care, in consequence, to be the. 
first to occupy the duchy of Narbonne. He had 
taken possession of the archbishopric on the 12th 
of March, 1212, and on the 13th he demanded 
homage of the viscount of Narbonne, and an oath 
of fidehty. * 

The fanaticism and cruelty of a monk were 
more easily pardoned, in that age, than the cu- 
pidity which induced him to seize upon the spoils 
of him whom he had persecuted. The monks of 
Citeaux began to sink in the estimation of the 
people, when it appeared that they had shed so 
much blood only for the opportunity of gaining 
possession of those episcopal sees which they cov- 
eted. . Perhaps the legate, Arnold Amalric, who, 
by this conduct, had highly offended Simon de 
Montfort, and had dissolved that intimate union 
which had hitherto subsisted between those two 
ferocious men, endeavoured to cause this symp- 
tom of ambition to be forgotten, by rendering 
new services to the church ; or perhaps he might 
be drawn, by his enthusiasm alone, to a new cru- 
sade, different from that which he had hith- 
erto preached. Be this as it may, he had 
scarcely taken possession of the archbishopric of 
Narbonne, before he passed into Spain, to aid 
the kings of Castille, of Aragon, and of Na- 
varre, against Mehemed-el-Nasir, king of Moroc- 
co, f 

This Emir-al-Mumenim had been called into 



*Hist. de Lang. liv. xxiii, ch. xvi, p. 223- Preuves ib. No. 
106, p. 236. 
t GujU. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xx, p. 677 



A.D. 1212.] THE ALBIGENSES. 105 

Spain by the victories of the Christian kings over 
the Moors of Andalusia. A mussulman crusade 
had been preached in Africa ; innumerable swarms 
of warriors had crossed the strait of Cadiz ; and 
the victory of the Moors at Alarcos, on the 18th 
of July, 1195, had given them a prodigious as- 
cendency over the Christians. After losing 
many provinces, Alphonso IX, of Castille, had 
been obHged to demand an armistice ; but this 
truce expired in 1212. The fanaticism of the 
Almohadans, who had annihilated the African 
church, gave reason to apprehend the entire ex- 
tirpation of Christianity from Spain. Innocent 
III had therefore granted the preaching of a new 
crusade, to succour the Spaniards. The abbot 
Arnold, archbishop of Narbonne, was not the 
only Gallic prelate who passed the Pyrenees ; 
the archbishop of Bordeaux and the bishop of 
Nantes arrived also at Toledo, and with them a 
considerable number of barons, knights, and pil- 
grims, from Aquitaine, France, and Italy. This 
multitude, rendered ferocious by the war against 
the Albigenses, distinguished itself, however, 
only by the massacre of the Jews of Toledo, 
which it effected, notwithstanding the efforts of 
the noble Castihans to protect them ; and, by its 
earnestness to put to death the Moorish garrison of 
Calatrava, in contempt of the capitulation. The 
French crusaders afterwards pretended, that they 
could no longer support the heat of the Spanish 
climate, and they retired before the terrible battle 
of Nevas de Tolosa, fought on the 16th of July, 
1212. This battle saved the Christians of 



106 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1212. 

Spain, and overturned the power of the Almoha- 
dans. * 

The crusade against the Moors of Spain occa- 
sioned but a short interruption to that against the 
Albigenses. ^ During the winter, Simon de Mont- 
fort had been reduced to the small number of 
knights attached to his fortunes ; but, at the same 
time, the monks of Citeaux had recommenced 
their preaching throughout all Christendom, with 
more ardour than ever ; and the expedition 
against the Albigenses, to which according to 
their assurances, such high celestial favours were 
attached, was, nevertheless, so short and so easy, 
that the army of the crusaders was renewed 
four times in the course of the year, by pilgrims, 
w^ho, after forty days' service returned to their 
homes. Guy de Montfort, the count's brother, 
(who had just returned from the Holy Land,) the 
provost of the church of Cologne, the archbishop 
of Rouen, the bishop of Laon, the bishop of Toul, 
and an archdeacon of Paris, were amongst the 
principal chiefs who, in the year 1212, came to 
range themselves under the banners of Montfort. 
Their hope of contributing to the slaughter and 
punishment of the Albigenses w^as not entirely 
disappointed, but they had no opportunity of dis- 
tinguishing themselves by great achievements in 
arms. Upon the arrival of these fanatical bands, 



*Roderici ArchiepiscopiToletanijlib. viii, cap. i, ii, p. 129, et 
seq. in Hisp. illustrala;, t. ii. Roderic of Toledo had himself 
preached the crusade in France and Italy, and he describes, in do- 
tail, the events of which he was the principal author. We can- 
not, however, admit his testimony for the incredible number of 
combatants, or that of the slain. lo. Marianne, lib. xi, cap. xxiii, 
xxiv, p. 548. 



A,D. 1212,] THE ALBIGENSES. 107 

almost all the castles of the Toulousians were 
abandoned by their inhabitants, who sought a 
refuge in the cities of Toulouse and Montauban, 
almost the only places which they thought proof 
against a siege. But the crusade had been 
preached only for the destruction of heretics ; 
the indulgences of the church were only promis- 
ed at this price. All the prelates who arrived in 
Albigeois, surrounded by bigots to whom they 
had promised the forgiveness of their sins, would 
have thought their vow unfulfilled if they had not 
avenged God against his rebels. They were, 
however, forced to content themselves with such 
fugitive peasants as they could surprise in the 
fields, or some prisoners, taken in the castles 
which had dared to resist them. Those of Saint 
Marcel and of Saint Antonin furnished them with 
a considerable number of human victims. But 
when Simon de Montfort saw that the greater 
part of the population of the countries, where 
heresy had prevailed, was exterminated, and that 
the remainder had placed themselves out of the 
reach of his attacks, he resolved to take advan- 
tage of the zeal of the crusaders, by conducting 
them into Agenois, whose entire population was 
catholic, and to make them gain their indulgences 
at the siege of la Penne, which, after an obsti- 
nate resistance, surrendered on the 25th of July.* 
The siege of Boissac, which followed, was re- 
markable only for the perfidy which Montfort 
compelled its inhabitants to practise. He re- 

* Petri Vail. Cern. Hist. Albig. cap. Ixiii, p. 616. Hist, gen.de 
Languedoc, liv. xxii,ch. xxv, p. 228 Historia de los faicts de 
Tolosa, p. 46. 



108 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D, 1212. 

fused to grant them their hves, till they had con- 
sented to sacrifice, with their own hands, three hund- 
red routiers, who formed their garrison, and who 
had, to that time valiantly defended them. On 
this condition, the gates of the city were opened 
to him on the 8th of September ; and the crusa- 
ders, contenting themselves with this carnage, re- 
ceived from the citizens a sum of money, to save 
their houses from the flames. * Simon conduc- 
ted his army, afterwards, into the counties of Foix 
and of Cominges, which he ravaged afresh, whilst 
the count Raymond of Toulouse, despoiled of al- 
most all his states, passed into Aragon, to im- 
plore the intercession of his brother-in-law, the 
king Don Pedro, with the court of Rome, f 

At the end of November, 1212, Simon de 
Montfort assembled a parliament at Pamiers. 
Under this title was commonly understood a diet, 
or conference of lords, who united voluntarily to 
deliberate and decide upon their own interests. 
The parliament of Pamiers was composed of 
archbishops and bishops ; of French knights 
drawn into the country by the crusades, or at- 
tached to the fortunes of Montfort ; of' certain 
knights who spoke the provencal language ; and 
and of some inhabitants of the principal cities of 
the country. The general of the crusade wished 
them to draw up statutes, for the government of 
the conquered provinces, and it w^as necessary 
that each order of his new subjects should be 

♦Petri Vail. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixiii, p. 621. Historia de 
Tolosa, p. 46. 

t Hist. Albig. Petri Vail. Cern. cap. Ixiv, p. 622. Hist, gen 
de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. xxx, p. 231. 



A.D. 1212.] THE ALBIGENSES. 109 

represented in his parliament, that he might en- 
sure their obedience. But he had also taken 
care, beforehand, to ensure to himself a .great 
majority. All the bishops were absolutely de- 
voted to him ; the knights-crusaders had no other 
interest than his ; the inhabitants of the country 
were intimidated ; and the statutes of Pamiers 
bear the impress of their oppression, and of the 
suspicions of the conqueror. Amongst fifty-one 
articles, some of which neverthelesss are favora- 
ble to the peasants and lowest classes of society, 
we may remark the prohibition to rebuild any of 
the fortresses which had been destroyed, without 
the express permission of the count; the order 
to all the cathoHc women, whose husbands were 
amongst the enemies of Montfort, to quit the es- 
tates under his dominion; the order to widows, 
or heiresses of noble fiefs, to marry none but 
Frenchmen, during the space of ten years. 
These marriages, joined to the confiscations and 
new infeodations which Montfort granted to his 
creatures, multiplied, in the province, the noble 
families of the north of France, who adopted, in 
their legislation, the customs of Paris, and caused 
the extinction of the greater number of ancient 
families, who prided themselves on descending 
either from the Romans or the Goths.* 

It was not in vain that the count of Toulouse 
took refuge with the king of Aragon, and implor- 
ed his protection at the court of Rome. This 
king was held in high consideration by Innocent 
III, and had rendered great services to the 

* Martene Thesaurus Anecdotorurn, torn, i, p. 831 seq. Hist, 
gii. de Languedoc, liy. xxii, ch. xxxiv, p. 233. 



110 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 121S. 

church. He could not see, without regret, his 
two sisters, one married to the count of Toulouse, 
the other to his son, stripped of their inheritance 
by Simon de Montfort ; or that all the princes of 
those provinces, the alUes and the vassals of the 
crown of Aragon, should be ruined ; that Simon 
should have refused to himself the service which 
he owed for his viscounties of Beziers and Car- 
cassonne ; and that he had not permitted the 
other feudatories of the province to render it, 
even in those moments of danger when Spain 
appeared on the point of sinking under the inva- 
sion of the Almohadans ; in a word, that he 
should destroy that dominion, which Don Pedro 
himself, and the princes of Aragon, his ancestors, 
had gradually obtained over the south of Gaul. 

The ambassadors of the king, Don Pedro, at 
the court of Rome, did their utmost therefore to 
convince the pope that Simon de Montfort was 
only an ambitious usurper ; that, whilst he invok- 
ed the name of religion, he thought of nothing 
but his own aggrandisement ; that he attacked, 
indifferently, catholics and heretics ; and that he 
had changed a crusade against heresy into a war 
of extermination against that Provencal nation of 
which the king of Aragon prided himself in being 
the chief.* 

Whether it was that Innocent III had been 
constantly deceived by his legates, and that the 
ambassadors of the king of Aragon shewed him 
the truth for the first time ; or whether he felt 



* Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixx, p. 635.— Hist. g^n. 
de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch, xxxvi, p. 234. — In Marianae Hist. 
Hisp. lil). xii, cap. ii, p, 557. 



A.D. 1213.] THE ALBIGENSES. HI 

some pity for the princes and people to whom he 
had already occasioned so much injury ; or wheth- 
er he at last began to suspect those whom he had 
rendered too powerful, and thought it more con- 
formable to the policy of the church, to raise 
from the ground the rival of Simon de Montfort, 
and oppose him to his conqueror, than to com- 
plete his ruin ; he entirely changed his language, 
in the letters, which, at the beginning of the year 
1213, he wrote to his legates and to Montfort. 

1213. The first of these letters, dated the 18th 
of January, is addressed to the legate Arnold, 
archbishop of Narbonne, to the bishop of Riez, 
and to master Theodise of Genoa. In this let- 
ter. Innocent III reproaches them with the murder 
of the viscount of Beziers, the usurpation of pro- 
vinces, even where there was no heresy, and with 
the cupidity they had displayed throughout the 
whole war. He informs them that Raymond 
had surrendered himself, with his son and all his 
states, into the hands of the king of Aragon, de- 
claring that he submitted entirely to the sentence 
of the church ; that this king, in possession of 
such pledges, announced, on his part, that he was 
ready to execute the judgment of the church, 
which he awaited ; that he engaged to provide 
that the son of the count of Toulouse, who had 
never been suspected of heresy, should be brought 
up in all the rigor of the catholic faith ; and he 
undertook that the father should proceed to the 
Holy Land, or to Spain, according as the pope 
should command, to combat the infidels, for the 
remainder of his days. Don Pedro, whose letter 
Innocent III almost entirely copied into his own. 



112 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1213. 

only demanded, that they should cease to preach 
the crusade agamst a country which had already 
submitted ; that they should not continue to in- 
vite the French, by all their spiritual rewards, to 
exterminate the Languedocians ; that, whatever 
determination Innocent III should take against 
the count of Toulouse, they should cease to con- 
found the innocent with the guilty ; and that, 
should they even find Raymond VI in fault, they 
should not, on that account, punish his son, who 
was not even suspected, or the counts of Foix and 
of Cominges, and the viscount of Beam, who had 
been involved in the war only for having fulfiled 
their feudal duties towards the count of Toulouse, 
their lord. After having inserted in his letter al- 
most the entire contents of that of the king of 
Aragon, Innocent III reproved his legates in a 
language which they were not accustomed to hear 
from him. He reproached them with their cupi- 
dity and ambition; he accused them of having 
shed the blood of the innocent, and of having in- 
vaded lands where heresy had never penetrated ; 
he commanded them to restore to the vassals of 
the king of Aragon, all that they had taken from 
them, that the king might not be diverted from 
the war which he was maintaining against the in- 
fidels. Two following letters, written by the pope 
to Simon de Montfort, are not less energetic, and 
shew no less that the atrocities of the war in Al- 
bigeois, were at last known at Rome.* 

The king of Aragon obtained equal success in 

* Innocentii III Epistolse lib. xv, ep. 212, 213, 214.— Hist. 
Gen. de Languedoo liv. xxii, ch. xxxvi, p. 234. — Duchesne 
Script, torn, v, p. 730, 731. 



A.D. 1213.] THE ALBIGENSES. 113 

an embassy that he sent to Phihp Augustus. He 
engaged this king to retain his son Louis, who was 
ready to set out for the crusade against the Albi- 
genses ; he, at the same, announced in the Isle 
of France, in Champagne and Burgundy, that 
the pope ceased to encourage this crusade, and 
exhorted the faithful rather to march to the relief 
of the Holy Land. The cardinal, Robert de 
Courcon, legate of the pope in France, declared 
himself against the continuation of the war ; so 
that the bishops of Toulouse and of Carcassonne, 
who were again going through the provinces of 
the North, to arm them against those of the South, 
found much difficulty in issuing their indulgences. 
At the same time, a new provincial council was 
called at Lavaur, either to hear the justification 
of Count Raymond, or to accept the submission 
promised by the king of Aragon, and to establish 
peace in the province.* 

1213. But Simon de Montforthad such zealous 
partisans in the bishops of the province of Nar- 
bonne, he had connected his cause so intimately 
with theirs, he had taken so much care to provide 
the monks of Citeaux, the principal instigators 
of the crusade, with all the pontifical sees which 
had become vacant, that he was sure of gaining 
his cause before such prejudiced judges as those 
to whom the pope had referred it. In fact, the 
authority of the holy see was never more com- 
pletely set at nought by its agents. Innocent III 
had repeatedly given positive orders to the bishop? 
of the province, to hear, and to judge of, the 

* Petri Vallis Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixvi, et seq. p. 624. 

7 



114 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1213. 

justifications of count Raymond ; and the bishops 
assembled at the council of Lavaur, in the month 
of January, 1213, again exphcitly refused to hear 
him, or to admit any of his justifications. They 
pretended that the count of Toulouse, by not ex- 
ecuting all the orders they had given him before, 
and by causing the murder of nearly a thousand 
Christians, through the war which he maintained 
aoainst the crusaders, had lost all right of plead- 
ino- his cause. They even refused to extend the 
benefits of the pacification to the counts of Foix 
and of Cominges, and to the viscount of Beam, 
whom they declared to be supporters of heretics. 
Above all, they insisted upon the necessity of de- 
stroying the city of Toulouse, and of exterminat- 
ing its inhabitants, that they might complete the 
purification of the province. And, as they had 
this object more at heart than all the others, the 
fathers of the council first addressed a common 
letter to the pope, recommending it to him ; and 
then, each prelate wrote to him separately, ear- 
nestly to press upon him the entire annihilation of 
that city, which they compared to Sodom and 
Gomorrah, and the destruction of all the villains 
who had taken refuge in it.* 

The agreement of all these bishops with Simon 
de Montfort and his numerous friends, the au- 
thority of the crusaders, of all those who had 
previously marched to the crusade, and of all 
who still intended to do so, made an impression 
upon Innocent III. It was he who had, at first, 

* Innocentii III, lib. xvi, Ep. 40, 41, 42. 44, 45. Histoire de 
Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. xliii, p. 241. 



A.D. 1213.] THE ALBIGENSES. 115 

excited the sanguinary spirits which then lorded 
it over Europe ; but he was himself, afterwards, 
the dupe of their concert. It was but too true, 
that the whole of Christendom then demanded 
the renewal of those scenes of carnage, that it 
prided itself on the slaughter of the heretics, and 
that it was in the name of pubhc opinion that 
the fathers of Lavaur required new massacres. 
Those who had contributed to create such a 
public opinion were, however, on that account, 
only the more guilty. Innocent III, deceived by 
the echo of his own voice, thought that he had 
shew^ed too much indulgence. He wrote ao-ain 
to the king of Aragon,the 21st of May, 1213, to 
revoke all the concessions he had made, to ac- 
cuse him of having taken advantage of the Roman 
court, by a false statem.ent, and to confirm the 
excommunication of the counts of Toulouse, of 
Cominges, of Foix, and of the viscount of 
Beam.* 

These negociations, at the court of Rome, had 
on neither side suspended the preparations for 
war ; but the number of the French crusaders 
had diminished, through the pains which the king 
of Aragon had taken to announce the pacification 
of the province, and through the declarations of 
the pope's legate himself. But the two bishops 
of Orleans and Auxerre, thought it, on this ac- 
count, much more their duty to proceed to the 



* Innocentii III Epist. lib. xvi, Ep. 48. Petri Val. Cern. Hist. 
Albigens. cap. Ixiv, p. 126 et seq. Concilium Vauriense in 
Labbei Concilia, t. xi,p. 81, seq. Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1213, 
§ xxvijseq. p. 221. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. li- p, 
246. "^ 



116 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1213. 

aid of Simon de Montfort, and they joined him 
at Carcassonne with many knights from their pro- 
vince.* On the other hand, the king of Aragon, 
flattering himself that if his brother-in-law could 
obtain a victory over Montfort, he would, by this 
means, put an end to the vacillations of the court 
of Rome, passed the Pyrenees with a thousand 
knio"hts, and came to join the counts of Toulouse, 
Foix, and Cominges. Don Pedro was at once a 
brave warrior, a skilful politician, and an elegant 
troubadour; he was subject to no other reproach 
than that of too passionate a love for women. At 
this very time he wrote to a lady of Toulouse, 
that it was for her sake he was come to combat 
the French knights, that he should be indebted 
to her beautiful eyes for the valor which he should 
show in the battle, and that from them he should 
expect the recompense of his achievements. This 
was the language consecrated to the gallantry of 
the age ; nor is there any reason to believe, as 
some moderns have supposed, that the letter was 
addressed to one of his sisters married to the two 
Raymonds of Toulouse. It fell, however, into 
the hands of Simon de Montfort. Our fortune is 
not doubtful, he exclaimed, God is for us. He 
has for him only the eyes of his lady.-f 

The king of Aragon, having united his forces 
with those of the counts his allies, went to lay 
siege to the little town of Muret, three leagues 
distant from Toulouse, on the south-west. He 
arrived before it on the 10th of September. He 

* Petri Vail. Cern. cap. Ixix, et seq. p. 233. 

t Guillelmus dePodio Laurentii, cap. xxi, p. 678. 



A.D. 1213.] THE ALBIGENSES. 117 

had joined to his thousand knights of Aragan, 
those of the counts of Toulouse, of Foix, of Com- 
inges, and of Gaston de Beam, which might, at 
most, form a number equal to his own. But the 
cavalry of the Pyrenees could not, any more than 
that of Spain, be compared with the French ca* 
valry, either in respect to the weight of the ar- 
mour, or the strength of the horses. The Span- 
iards, principally accustomed to contend with th© 
Mussulmans, had acquired their method of fight- 
ing; and their squadrons more resembled light 
cavalry, than the heavy horse of the French. 
Simon de Montfort, who had assembled his troops 
at Saverdun, in the countship of Foix, had with 
him about a thousand knights, or Serjeants at arms. 
These might be regarded as the flower of French 
knighthood ; they were men enveloped in iron ; 
and their bodies seemed as iron as their armour. 
Amongst them was distinguished, Wilham des 
Barres, uterine brother of Montfort, the ancient 
rival of Richard Coeur-de-hon, and the most re- 
nowned of all the warriors of France. Many 
others, without equalling him in reputation, did 
not yield to him either in strength or courage. 
Amongst them all, not a heart could be found 
susceptible of terror, or accessible to pity. Equal- 
ly inspired by fanaticism and the love of war, 
they believed that the sure way to salvation was 
through the field of carnage. Seven bishops, 
who followed the army, had blessed their stand- 
ards and their arms, and would be engaged in 
prayer for them whilst they were attacking the 
heretics. Thus did they advance, indifferent 
whether to victory or martyrdom, certain that 



118 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1213. 

either would issue in the reward which the hand 
of God himself had destined for them. Simon 
de Montfort, passing the Garonne at their head, 
entered, without any obstacle, into the town of 
Muret, and prepared for battle on the following 
day, the 12th of September. 

The cavalry, at that time, foraied the only force 
of armies. A warrior, entirely covered with iron 
as well as his horse, overturning the infantry, 
piercing them with his heavy lance, or cutting 
them down with his sabre, had nothing to fear 
from the miserable footmen, exposed in every part 
to his blows, scarcely armed with a wretched 
sword, and who had neither been exercised to 
discipline or danger. Nevertheless, it was the 
custom to summon these also to the armies, either 
that they might labor at the sieges, or that they 
might despatch the vanquished, after a defeat. 
Simon de Montfort had assembled the militia of 
the cities which were subject to him; Raymond, 
on his part, had caused the levies of the Toulous- 
ians to march, and these were much the most nu- 
merous. As it was afterwards attempted to find 
out something miraculous, both in the dispropor- 
tion of number, and in the extent of the carnage, 
the historians of the church affirmed, that the 
militia, under the orders of the king of Aragon, 
amounted to sixty thousand men; they allow, 
however, that they were not engaged. 

Simon de Montfort, quitting, on the morning of 
the 12th of September, the gates of Muret, in 
order to seek his enemies, did not march strait 
towards them, but kept along the side of the Ga- 
ronne, from the eastern gate, so as to make it 



A.D. 1213.] THE ALBIGENSES. 119 

appear to the king of Aragon and his allies, who 
were also under arms, that his design was to es- 
cape. But, all at once, turning sharply upon the 
army of Don Pedro, he repulsed the count of 
Foix, who commanded the advanced guard, and 
encountered the body led by the king of Aragon 
himself. Two French knights, Alain de Roucy, 
and Florent de Ville, had agreed, unitedly to at- 
tack the king, to attach themselves wholly to his 
person, and to suffer no assailant to divert them 
from the pursuit, until they had killed him. Pe- 
dro of Aras^on had chang-ed armour with one of 
his bravest knights. But, when the two French- 
men had, at the same time, broken their lances 
against him who wore the royal armour, Alain, 
seeing him bend under the stroke, cried out im- 
mediately, Thu is not the Icing, for he is a bet- 
ter Jcnight. No truly, that is not he, but here 
he is, instantly replied Don Pedro, who was near 
at hand. This bold declaration cost him his life. 
A band of knights, who were waiting the orders 
of Alain and Florent, surrounded him immediate- 
ly, and neither left him, nor suffered him to es- 
cape, till they had thrown him hfeless from his 
horse. As the French had anticipated, the death 
of the king of Aragon occasioned the rout of his 
army. Simon, who had remained at the head of 
tlie rear-guard of the crusaders, did not come up 
with his enemies till the news of this event had 
already circulated amongst them, and he profited 
by it to press, more vigorously, the three counts, 
and Gaston de Beam, whom he compelled to 
flight. Arrived at the place where Don Pedro 
had fallen, and where his body was already strip- 



120 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1213. 

ped by the infantry of the crusaders, it is said, 
he could not forbear shedding a few tears ; but 
this apparent compassion was only the signal for 
new displays of fury. He fell upon the infantry 
of the Toulousians, who had taken no part in the 
battle, and who, abandoned by their knights, 
could make no resistance against a powerful cav- 
alry ; and, having first cut off their retreat, he 
destroyed nearly the whole, either by putting 
them to the sword, or drowning them in the wa- 
ters of the Garonne.* 



* Petri Val. Cera. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxj, et seq. p. 637. 
Litterae Prpelatorum qui in exercitu Simonis erant, ibid, cap. 
Ixxiii, p. 641. Guillelmi de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxi, xxii, p. 
678. Prseclara Francor. Fatinova, p. 767. Bernardi Guidonis, 
p. 483. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 53. Chronic, o 
Coramentj delrey en Jacme, cap. viii. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, 
p. 249, etseq. liv. xxii, ch. Ivi. Raynaldi Annal. Eccl. 1213, § 
56, seq. p. 227. Joan. Marianse Hist. Hisp. lib, xii, cap, ii, p, 
558. 



CHAPTER IIL 



[From A.D. 1213, to A.D. 1218.1 



1214. The activity of Simon de Montfort 
always seconded his unmeasurable ambition. He 
never estimated riches and power any otherwise 
than as they might promote the acquisition of 
still greater riches and power. He had never 
known any other relaxation from his victories than 
the preparation for new conquests. He had never 
understood any other way of rendering himself 
acceptable to God, than by shedding the blood 
of infidels, nor felt any other religious emotion 
than the delight of being the spectator of their 
torments. Nevertheless he gained no extraordi- 
nary advantages from the battle of Muret. The 
crusaders, after that great victory, thought their 
task accomplished, and then duty towards God 
fulfilled, so that they, with one consent, hastened 
to their homes. The court of Rome hesitated, 
for fear of rendering its creature too powerful. 
Philip Augustus indirectly placed obstacles to the 
zeal of the crusaders, by publishing an ordinance 
to limit their privileges. He no longer permitted 
them to withdraw from the defence of their coun- 
try, by abstaining from marching at their lord's 
summons, though he still left them the choice be- 



122 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1214, 

tween service and payment. He no longer per- 
mitted them to decline the jurisdiction of the 
temporal tribunals, either when they were accu- 
sed of crimes, or when they pleaded for their 
fief or their manor. ^ Besides, the Catelans and 
the Aragonese were indignant at seeing the son 
of the king, whom they had lost, under the tute- 
lage of him who had shed his father's blood. 
They had declared war against Simon de Mont- 
fort, and were preparing to attack him on the side 
of tne Pyrenees, whilst their ambassador to In- 
nocent III, was endeavouring to obtain the inter- 
ference of the court of Rome, in defence of their 
independence. And they laboured so effectually 
that Innocent III, by his letter of the 23rd of 
January, 1214, commanded Simon to restore the 
young Don Jayme to his subjects ; which order 
was executed, at Narbonne, in the month of April 
following, f 

A new legate, the cardinal Peter of Beneven- 
to, had this year come to the province. He had 
fixed his residence at Narbonne, and all the lords, 
who had been so ill treated in the last war, had 
flocked to him to obtain, by his intercession, their 
reconciliation with the church. Much more ac- 
commodating, at least in appearance, than his 
predecessor, he reopened, to them all, the door 
of the sanctuary. During the month of AjDril, 
the counts of Foix, and of Cominges, were recon- 
ciled to the church ; the same grace was after- 
wards extended to Raymond VI, and, at last, to 

*Lauriere, Ordonnances des Rois de France, torn, i, p. 32. 
flnnocentii III Epistolag, lib. xvi, no. 171. Histoire gen. de 
Languedoc, liv. xxii. ch. Ixvii, p. 259. 



A.D 1214.] THE ALBIGENSES. 123 

the inhabitants of Narbonne and Toulouse. It is 
true that by the oath which these lords, and the 
consuls of the cities, took to the legate, they re- 
signed their bodies and goods to his disposal, 
without any guarantee ; they engaged to obey 
all his orders ; opened to him all their castles ; 
reserved no lordship ; nor made any stipulations 
in their own favour. Raymond, who had previ- 
ously ceded all his rights to his son, withdrew, at 
the same time, from the Narbonnese castle, the 
ancient residence of the sovereigns, and w^ent to 
dwell with his son, as a simple individual, in a 
private house at Toulouse, waiting the decision 
of the sovereign pontiff whether he should retire 
to the king of England, to the Holy Land, or to 
Rome. * 

At the very time when the lords of the Albi- 
genses were thus submitting themselves to the 
discretion of the church, a new army of crusaders, 
conducted by the bishop of Carcassonne and the 
cardinal Robert de Courjon arrived at Montpel- 
lier. ' How great was then the mercy of God,' 
cries the monk of Vaux-Cernay, ' for every one 
may see that the pilgrims could have done noth- 
ing great without the legate, nor the legate with- 
out the pilgrims. In reahty the pilgrims would 
have had but small success, against such numer- 
ous enemies, if the legate had not treated with 
them beforehand. It was then by a dispensation 
of the divine mercy, that whilst the legate, by a 

*Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. Ixix, p. 261. 
Preuves, nos. ex, cxi, cxii, p. 239 etseq, Petri Val. Cern. Hist. 
Albigens. cap. Ixxvii, p. 647. Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. 
xxiv, p.680 



124 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1214. 

pious fraud, cajoled, and enclosed in his nets, the 
enemies of the faith who were assembled at Nar* 
bonne, the count of Montfort, and the pilgrims 
who were arrived from France, could pass into 
Agenois, there to crush their enemies, or rather 
those of Christ. O pious fraud of the legate ! O 
piety full of deceit.' * 

Nevertheless, this treason, which the pious ce- 
nobite celebrates with such enthusiasm, does not 
appear to have produced results, proportioned to 
the admiration with which it inspired him. The 
campaign was devoted to the besieging and taking 
of several castles of Quercy and Agenois, some 
of which made a pretty long resistance, and cost 
much blood to the crusaders. In the greater 
part they found no heretics, which reduced the 
soldiers of the church to the necessity of mourn- 
fully burning the castle, or at the most of only 
putting the inhabitants to the sword, as in an or- 
dinary war. But at Maurillac they were more 
happy. 'I must not pass it over,' says the 
monk of Citeaux, ' that we found there seven her- 
etics, of the sect called Waldenses, who being 
conducted to the legate, and having confessed 
their incredulity, were seized by our pilgrims, and 
burned with unspeakable joy.' f 

Simon de Montfort did not trust to his arms 
alone for making conquests. In 1214 he married 
his son Amaury, to Beatrice, daughter of Guigue 
VI dauphin of Viennois, in the hope that she 
would one day inherit Dauphiny ; for this name 

* Petri Vail. Cern. Albig. cap. Ixxviii, p. 648. 
t Petri Vall. Cern. cap. Ixxix, p. 649. 



A.D. Ir215.] THE ALBIGENSES. 125 

had then been given to the heritage of the counts 
of Albon, which had passed into the house of 
Burgundy, and held from the kingdom of Aries ; 
whilst those lords had taken the title of dauphins 
from their armorial bearings.* On the other 
hand, a provincial council, summoned at Mont- 
pelher for the month of December, but which 
did not commence its sitting till the eight of Jan- 
uary, 1215, was to determine the fate of the prov- 
inces, formerly occupied by the counts of Tou- 
louse, of Beam, and of Cominges, whom the car- 
dinal legate had reconciled to the church, without 
explaining the conditions that he should impose 
upon them.f 

1215. The inhabitants of Montpelher did not 
consider their lordship as one of those which the 
council, assembled in their city, had the right to 
dispose of. The m_arriage of Mary, daughter of 
William VIII of Montpelher, with Don Pedro of 
Aragon, had, in 1204, subjected their city to the 
king, who had been recently killed at Muret. 
But the inhabitants of Montpelher possessed great 
privileges and a municipal government. For two 
centuries, at least, they had obeyed their own 
lords residing in their city, to whose houses they 
were strongly attached. Nor was it without re- 
gret that they saw themselves transferred to a 
distant monarch, who governed them negligently 
by a subaltern, and who on all occasions sacrificed 
their interests to those of his own subjects. When 
. Don Pedro was kihed at the battle of Muret, 

* Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. Ix, p. 256, and ch. Ixxi, 
p> 262. Histoire de Dauphine, torn, i, p. 248. 
t Petri Val. Cera. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxxvi, p. 654. 



126 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1215. 

they considered their connexion with the crown 
of Aragon as dissolved, and refused to acknowl- 
edge his son Don Jayme. At first they thought 
of forming themselves into a republic, after the 
example of the Italian cities, with whom they 
had constant commercial intercourse ; but those 
cities acknowledged in the emperor a supreme 
lord, whose authority over them had been deter- 
mined at the peace of Constance. The city of 
Montpellier thought it therefore right to place it- 
self in the same relation to King Philip Augustus, 
the supreme lord of all France. They regarded 
him as too distant for them to fear any abuse of 
authority, whilst they flattered themselves, that 
his name alone would protect them both against 
the pretensions of the Aragonese, and, what was 
more to be dreaded, against the ambition of Si- 
mon de Montfort. Philip Augustus, in fact, con- 
sented to take under his safeguard, for five years, 
the lives of the citizens of Montpellier, their 
gooods, and their city. He made, however, this 
condition, that his protection should remain only 
as long as the pope should not give order to the 
crusaders to attack them, for he was resolved not 
to oppose his authority to that of the church.* 

It appears that the church formed no projects 
against them, and that there was no ground for 
regarding them as submitted to the jurisdiction of 
the crusade ; but, their orthodoxy was not a suf- 
ficient security against the enterprises of Simon 
de Montfort. When all the bishops of the pro- 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. Ixviii, p, 260. Charles 
de Philippe Auguste . Preuves, p . 238 . 



A.D. 1215.] THE ALBIGENSES. 127 

vince were assembled in council at Montpellier, 
to decide upon the sovereignty of the countries 
conquered by the crusaders, Montfort, who wish- 
ed to direct that assembly, and who looked to it 
to legitimate those titles, which he held by perfidy 
and robbery alone, formed also the project of pro- 
fiting by the conferences which he might have 
with the prelates, to obtain possession of the city 
of Montpellier. The citizens, who suspected his 
designs, would not permit his entrance into their 
city, and assigned for these conferences the house 
of the Templars, situated without their walls. 
But Peter of Benevento, cardinal legate, abusing 
the respect with which his high dignity inspired 
the guards of the gates, took Simon de Montfort 
by the arm, mingled the two sons of that count, 
and a great number of knights, in his suite, and 
in this manner entered the city. However, when 
the citizens of Montpelher saw these knights 
marching, on horseback, through their streets, a 
universal cry, to take arms and defend their lib- 
erties, soon assembled them in crowds. They 
barricadoed the streets, and surrounded the church 
of Notre Dame, where the council was sitting, 
and Simon de Montfort thought himself happy to 
escape from the city through a by-way.* 

This little check did not prevent Simon de 
Montfort from succeeding in the principal object 
of his ambition. The council of Montpellier was 
composed of five archbishops, of Narbonne, of 
Auch, of Embrun, of Aries, and of Aix, with the 



+ Pertri Vail. Cern. Hist. Albig. cap. Ixxxi, p. 654. Hist, 
gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. Ixxvi, p. 266. 



128 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1215. 

bishops their suffragans, to the number of twen- 
ty-eight. These fathers decreed, with a unani- 
mous consent, as the monk of Vaux-Cernay as- 
sures us, that Simon de Montfort should occupy 
Toulouse, and all the other conquests which the 
Christian crusaders had made, and should govern 
them in quality of prince and monarch of the 
country^ Count Raymond VI, who, before ev- 
ery thing, and at any price, wished to be recon- 
ciled to the church, offered no resistance to this 
decree. He left to the monarch, his sovereign, 
the care of protesting against so strange an inva- 
sion of the secular power. He dehvered the 
Narbonnese castle, the palace of the sovereigns, 
to the bishop Fouquet, who came with armed 
men to take possession of it, and went to lodge, 
with his son and the two countesses, at the house 
of a private individual of. Toulouse, named David 
de Roaix. The prelate demanded, at the same 
time, hostages from the city, and caused to be 
delivered to him twelve out of the twenty-four 
consuls, whom he conveyed to Aries. f 

The conquest of the province appeared to be 
completed. The greater part of the Albigenses, 
with thousands of catholics, had perished by the 
executioners. The hght of the first reformation 
was extinguished in blood, and even Simon him- 
self was much more occupied with governing his 
conquests, than with exciting new persecutions. 
But the movement impressed on the minds of the 

* Petri Vail. Cern. Albig. cap. Ixxxi, p. 654. Concilia Gener- 
alia, torn, xi, p. 103. 

t Petri Val . Cern. Hist. Alb. cap. Ixxxi, p. 655. Guil. de Podio 
Lauientii. cap. xxiv, p. 680. 



A.D. 1215.] THE ALBIGENSES. 129 

people, by the preachers of the crusade, did not 
cease with the suppression of heresy. There 
were no longer any Albigenses to sacrifice, but 
thousands of missionaries still continued to ram- 
ble about the towns and villages, stirring up the 
people, by promising them the joys of paradise 
in recompense for the blood they should shed. 
This new method of gaining indulgences was so 
much more easy than the crusade to the holy 
land ; the expedition might be accomplished with 
so little fatigue, expense, or danger, that there 
was not a knight who did not wish to wash away 
his sins with the blood of tlie heretics ; and thus 
each spring produced a new swarm of crusaders. 
At the commencement of the year 1215, prince 
Louis, son of Phihp Augustus, wished, in his 
turn, to perform a pilgrimage, and to serve forty 
days against the Albigenses. He arrived at Ly- 
ons the 19th of April, with a much more consid- 
erable force than he could have assembled, if he 
had only been going to combat temporal enemies, 
such as the Flemings or the English. The bish- 
op of Beauvais, the counts of Saint Paul, of 
Ponthieu, of Seez, and of Alencon, the viscount 
of Melun, the lords of Beaujeu, and of Mont- 
morency had desired to participate, with a great 
number of knights of less illustrious names, in 
this work of sanctification ; and immense was the 
number of citizens, peasants, and adventurers, 
who had followed his standard, to Hve for six. 
weeks at discretion in Languedoc, to pillage 
houses and castles, and to sing, in chorus, the 
hymn Veni Creator, around the stake at which 
the heretics were burning. 

d 



130 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1215. 

When Simon de Montfort and the legate were 
informed of the approach of this army, which 
was marching against them akhough the war was 
terminated, and which had no country to ravage 
but that now become their property, they were 
greatly alarmed. They feared that Louis, if he 
once got into the country, would either defend 
the count of Toulouse, his near relation, or the 
rights of the crown, usurped by the council of 
Montpellier. Simon de Montfort w^ent to meet 
him at Vienne, and from that time never quitted 
him. The legate, on his side, took care to inform 
the prince royal, that coming, as a crusader and 
pilgrim, into a country conquered by the crusad- 
ers, he neither could nor ought to oppose himself, 
in any thing, to the arrangements which had been 
made by the ecclesiastics.* 

But the suspicions of these tw^o ambitious 
adventurers were without foundation. Neither 
prince Louis nor his knights had any political 
object, but came into the south solely to fulfil their 
vows. He visited, in company with Simon, the 
cities of Montpellier, Beziers, Carcassonne, and 
Toulouse ; he permitted the count of Toulouse 
and his son to go and seek an asylum with the 
king of England ; and returned by Montauban, 
at which place it appears that Simon de Montfort 
took leave of him.f 

It was now two years since Innocent III had 
summoned, for the year 1215, an oecumenical or 

* Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albig. cap. Ixxxii, p. 656. 
fHist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch.lxxxi — Ixxxviij p. 
268—273. 



A.D. 1215.] THE ALBIGENSES. . 131 

general council, in which the whole church should 
be called to decide the great interests w^hich were 
then simultaneously in discussion. This, which 
was the twelfth of the general councils, and the 
fourth of those of Lateran, was composed of se- 
venty-one metropolitans, of four hundred and 
twelve bishops, and nearly eight hundred abbots. 
Two of the patriarchs were present, and the two 
others were represented by their deputies. The 
two orders of the Franciscans, and the Domini- 
cans, those terrible soldiers of the pope, received 
then the sanction of the universal church ; a new 
expedition, for the defence and recovery of the 
Holy Land was resolved upon, which was the 
fifth crusade ; some heresies were condemned, 
and some canons estabhshed for the discipline of 
the church ; and amongst them v»^e ought partic- 
ularly to remark the twenty-second, which im- 
posed on each Christian, for the first time, the 
obligation of confessing himself once in the year, 
to receive the communion at Easter, and which 
transformed a habit of devotion into a duty, the 
observance of which was, from that time, enforc- 
ed hj the- heaviest penalties. In fine, the coun- 
cil of Lateran put an end to the preaching of the 
crusade against the Albigenses, and disposed of 
the countries conquered by the crusaders.* 

Count Raymond VI, his son Raymond YIJ, 
and the counts of Foix and Cominges, had all 
proceeded to Rome to plead their cause before 
the assembled church, whilst Simon had, on his 

* Labbe Concilia Generalia, t. xi, p. 117. 240. Raynaldi Ann. 
Ecclesiw 1215, § i,c. xx, p. 241. 



132 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1215. 

part, sent his brother Guy de Montfort. The 
counts presented to the pope a recommendation 
from the king of England ; they threw themselves 
at his knees ; they exposed the crying injustice 
which Montfort had committed against them, in 
contempt of the pontifical authority itself. Many 
fathers in the council strenuously defended the 
persecuted counts ; they spoke, with execration, 
of the horrors committed in the province, and re- 
peatedly reproached the bishop Fouquet with 
having destroyed more than ten thousand persons, 
of the flock committed to his care. Innocent III 
himself appeared touched. He expressed much 
good will both to Raymond VI and his son ; but 
the greater number of the fathers were heated by 
the fanaticism of the crusade, and thought that 
all disfavor, showed to Montfort, would tend to 
the discouragement of the faithful ; and they at 
last agreed with the pope to pubhsh a decree, 
which gave to Montfort the cities of Toulouse 
and of Montauban, the countship of Toulouse, 
and all the countries conquered by the crusaders, 
reserving to Raymond VII the countship of Ve- 
naissin and the marquisate of Provence. The 
decision respecting the countships of Foix and 
Cominges was adjourned ; but it appears, that 
the two counts were provisionally put into pos- 
session of their states.* 

We have thus traced the total extinction of the 
first reformation. The slaughter had been so pro- 
digious, the massacres so universal, the terror so 
I ^^_^ 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 57, et seq. Petri Vall. 
Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxxiii, p. 658. Guil. de Podio Lau- 
rentii, c, xxvij p. 681. Seutentia de terra Albig. Concil. Gen. t. 
XI, pk 234 Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, cli. xcvi — c, p. 277. 



A.D. 1216.] THE ALBIGENSES. 133 

profound, and of so long duration, that the church 
appeared to have completely attained her object. 
The worship of the reformed Albigenses had ev- 
ery where ceased. All teaching was become im- 
possible. Almost all the doctors of the new 
church had'perished in a frightful manner ; and the 
very small number of those who had succeeded in 
escaping the crusaders, had sought an assylum in 
the most distant regions, and were able to avoid 
new persecutions only by preserving the most ab- 
solute silence respecting their doctrines and their 
ancient discipline. The private believers, who 
had not perished by the fire and the sword, 
or w^ho had not withdrawn by flight from the 
scrutiny of the inquisition, knew that they could 
only save their lives by burying their secret in 
their own bosoms. For them there were no more 
sermons, no more prayers, no more Christian com- 
munion, no more instruction ; even their children 
were not made acquainted with their secret senti- 
ments. 

1216. The triumph appeared so complete, 
that the persecutors, in the confidence of their 
victory, became divided, made war reciprocally 
against each other, and were ruined. We are 
about to see their errors at the end of the reign of 
Philip Augustus, and, during that of his son, the 
relaxation of their vigilance, and the apparent res- 
urrection of the sect which they had crushed. 
But this momentary interruption to the persecu- 
tion served only to render it the more destructive. 
After the extinction of the fire, some scattered 
sparks were still concealed under the ashes ; 
those who had laboured to extinguish it, by turn- 



134 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1216, 

ing off their attention, permitted those sparks to 
kindle a new flame ; and this, having devoured 
all the combustible matter that remained, was 
then quenched in its turn. The momentary tol- 
eration in Albigeois recalled thither the preach- 
ers and the sectaries who had escaped the 
first massacre, and involved them all in the sec- 
ond. 

Thus the reformation, of which the church had 
so much need, the light which was to illuminate 
the mind, restore to morals their purity, and to 
reason its empire, was repelled for three whole 
centuries ; and even much longer with regard to 
those nations which spoke the Romanesque lan- 
guages. , They had been the first to perceive the 
necessity of a better economy in the church ; and 
the light had appeared at the same time in Italy, 
in France, and in Spain. * The Paterins, the 
Waldenses, the Albigenses, had spread their in- 
structions through all the contries which had been 
comprised in the western empire ; whilst the in^ 
tellect of the Germanic nations was not yet suffi- 
ciently advanced to admit the new docttines. 
But, the greater part of those preachers of a pur- 
er morality having perished in the flames of the 
inquisition, the effort which the Romanesque race 
had made for its amelioration having failed, its 
energy remained long exhausted ; the chains 
which had been imposed upon it w^ere drawn 
tighter by the very effort which had been made 
to break them ; and when the new reformers ap- 

* On the progress of the reform of the Albigenses, in the king- 
dom of Leon and Galicia, see Jo. Mariana de rebus Hifpan. lib. ii. 
cap. ij p. 556. 



A.D. 1216.] THE ALBIGENSES. 135 

peared, in the sixteenth century, the doctrines, 
which they proposed to the people, had lost the 
attraction of novelty, and only awakened the ter- 
rors which the ancient chastisements had left in 
every soul. 

The two first leaders of the crusade, those who 
had signalized their devotion by the greatest 
crimes and atrocities, the count of Montfort and 
the abbot Arnold of Citeaux, quarrelled about the 
division of their conquests. Arnold had siezed 
upon the rich and powerful archbishopric of Nar- 
bonne, to which he pretended that sovereign 
rights were attached. Simon, in taking posses- 
sion of the spoils of Raymond VI, had assumed 
the title of duke of Narbonne as well as that of 
count of Toulouse. In this conflict of jurisdic- 
tions, the inhabitants of Narbonne inchned to- 
wards the archbishop, which was a sufficient rea- 
son for Montfort to accuse them of being suspec- 
ted of heresy, and to demand the demolition of 
tlieir walls. The archbishop opposed it ; Simon 
entered the city by force, in spite of the opposi- 
tion of Arnold, and displaced his ducal standard 
in the viscount's palace. On his part, the arch- 
bishop fulminated an excommunication against his 
ancient collea^^ue, against that Simon de Mont- 
fort, who had gloried, on all occasions, in being 
the executioner of the excommunicated. Dur- 
ing the time that Montfort remained at Narbonne, 
Arnold placed all the churches of the city under 
an interdict ; a sentence to which Montfort pay- 
ed no regard. The death of Innocent III, whose 
support Arnold had implored, and the succession 
of Honorius III, retarded the decision of this 



136 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1216. 

cause, and we know not how it terminated. Si- 
mon de Montfort continued, however, to bear the 
title of duke of Narbonne, and he threw down 
many parts of the wall of that city, into which he 
wished to have the power of entering at all 
times. * 

Simon de Montfort's other capital, Toulouse, 
had no less aversion for its new lord. Simon 
quitted Narbonne to proceed thither, and sum- 
moned, for the 7th of March, 1216, an assembly 
of all the inhabitants, in the palace of the counts, 
to receive their homage and oath of fidelity. In 
return, he and his son engaged toward them, by an 
oath sufficiently vague, to observe all their fran- 
chises. Nevertheless, he appeared to trust much 
more to force, than to the affection of the inhabi- 
tants, for the guarantee of their obedience ; and 
for this purpose, he laboured with activity, on the 
one hand, to augment the fortifications of the 
Narbonnese castle, and on the other, to ruin those 
of the city and its suburbs.f Whilst these two 
works were going on, he set out, in the month of 
April, for the court of Philip Augustus, to receive, 
from that monarch, the investiture of the fiefs 
which the crusaders had conquered. During all 
his journey he was received and honoured as the 
champion of the faith ; the most pious formed 
processions to meet him, and thought themselves 
happy if they could touch his garments. Philip, 
who was then at Pont-de-l'Arche, gave him the 
most favourable reception, invested him with the 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxii, ch. ci, et seq. p. 281. 
fCruill. de Podio Laur. cap. xxvi, p. 681, Hist, de Languedoc, 
liv. xxii, cli. cii. p. 284. 



A.D. 1216.] THE ALBIGENSES. 137 

dukedom of Narbonne, the countsliip of Toulouse, 
and the viscountships of Beziers and Carcassonne, 
and acknowledged him for his vassal and liege- 
man.* Raymond VI had, however, received 
the absolution of the church, and was reconciled 
to it ; but though he w^as cousin-german to the 
king of France, brother-in-law to the emperor 
Frederic and the king of England, father-in-law 
to Sancho king of Navarre, and uncle to the kings 
of Castille and Aragon, he saw himself abandoned 
by them all ; or at least, if the king of England 
continued to show him some attachment, he could 
not render him any assistance.! 

A part of Provence, which the house of Tou- 
louse possessed under the title of marquisate, had 
been reserved by the council of Lateran to Ray- 
mond VI and his son. Those two princes, re- 
turning by Marseilles from that assembly, began 
by causing the Provencals to acknowledge their 
authority. They found their ancient subjects 
much more zealous for their cause, since they had 
experienced the exactions and arrogance of the 
count of Montfort and his Frenchmen. The council 
of Lateran had put an end to the crusade against 
the Albigenses. No more indulgences were 
preached, the pious were no longer invited to re- 
pair to the South, in order to massacre heretics 
already extirpated. Simon de Montfort was re- 
duced to his own forces, or to the mercenaries 

* Petri Val. Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. lxxxiii,p. 659. Hist, 
de Lauguedoc, liv. xxii, cli. ciii, p. 285. Preuves, ibid. p. 252 
seq. 

tGiiill. de Podio Laur. cap. xxvil. p. 682. Hist. gen. de Lan- 
guedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. i, ii, p. 287, 288. 



138 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1216. 

whom he could enroll. Marseilles, Tarascon, 
and Avignon, had declared for the two Raymonds, 
and the younger, on taking leave of Innocent 
III, had received from this old pope, a sort of 
acquiescence in his attempting to recover his her- 
itage by force. Raymond VII, by the aid of the 
Provencals, formed an army, with which he com- 
menced his operations against Montfort ; he be- 
gan by the taking of Beaucaire, whose inhabit- 
ants opened their gates to him, whilst his father 
passed into Aragon, to seek for new succors.* 

Raymond VII, though master of the city of 
Beaucaire, had not possession of^ the castle, 
where a French garrison still defended itself. He 
undertook the siege without suffering himself to 
be discouraged by the approach of Montfort, at 
the head of considerable forces. He was then 
only nineteen years of age, and he defended the 
city into which he had entered against that illus- 
trious captain, whilst, before his eyes, he took the 
castle which Montfort came to relieve. In this 
double siege, signahzed by actions of great valor, 
the Provencals made use of Greek fire, the com- 
position of which they had learned in the Holy 
Land.f 

Raymond VI had, on his side, raised an army 
in Aragon and Catalonia, and was approaching 
Toulouse, which had already declared openly in 
his favor. But Simon de Montfort, who was 



* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxvii, p. 682. Hist. gen. de 
Languedoc, lib. xxiii, ch. i, ii, p. 287, 288. 

fHistoria de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 63 et seq. Petri Vall. 
Cern. Hist. Albigena. cap. Ixxxiii, p. 659. Guill. de Podio, cap. 
sxviii, p. 682. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, p. 291. 



A.D. 1216.] THE ALBIGENSES. 139 

thus attacked on two opposite frontiers, so that 
his enemies could not communicate together with- 
out great difficuky and loss of time, profited by 
this circumstance to conclude a truce with Ray- 
mond VII, and hastened to the defence of his 
capital. Raymond VI had not force sufficient to 
make head against him, and retired towards the 
mountains. The Toulousians, terrified at the at- 
tachment they had shown to their ancient lord, 
sought pardon of Montfort. All the lords of the 
army supported their solicitations ; they advised 
him to exact the fifth, or the fourth of their 
moveable goods, and to content himself with this 
pecuniary punishment, which would fill his treas- 
ury, and give him the power of besieging Beau- 
caire anew. But Simon would listen to no other 
counsels than those of the ferocious Fouquet, 
bishop of Toulouse, a prelate who knew no pleas- 
ure but that of shedding the blood of his flock. 
* And then,' says the old historian of Toulouse, 
' spoke the bishop of Toulouse, and thus he said, 
and made him to understand, that he should do 
and finish what he had already determined against 
the Toulousians, assuring him that they would 
not love him ever so little except by force, and 
^exhorting him to leave them nothing, if once he 
was within their city, but to take both goods and 
people as much as he could have and hold, for 
know, my lord, added he, that if you do thus, it 
will be late before you repent of it.'* 

To preach ferocity, was not all the labor of 
the bishop Fouquet ; he took upon himself, be- 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 78 . 



140 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1216. 

sides, to facilitate, by perfidy, the execution of 
his counsels. He entered the city as a messen- 
ger of peace, ' In order that I may, said he to 
the count, make all the people come out to meet 
you, that you may seize and take them, which 
you could not do in the city.' In fact he solicit-^ 
ed his flock to apply, by successive deputations, 
of inen, women, and children, to the count de 
Montfort, assuring them that this was the only 
means of appeasing him, and disarming his anger. 
The most considerable persons in the city thought 
they could not refuse to credit their pastor, w4io 
swore by the name of that God w4iom he was 
commissioned to preach to them, that his ardent 
charity alone dictated the advice which he had 
given for their welfare. Nevertheless, as the 
citizens of Toulouse arrived successively before 
Simon de Montfort, he loaded them with chains. 
Already more than eighty of them were in irons, 
when a citizen, whom they were going to treat 
in the same way, escaped from their hands and 
called his fellow-citizens to arms. The crowds 
who were proceeding from the gates to humble 
themselves before the count, fled back to the 
city; but rage soon succeeded to terror: they 
armed themselves, barricaded all the streets, and 
awaited the attack of Montfort. Already had 
his soldiers entered the less populous parts of the 
city. ' Directed by the bishop,' says our histo- 
rian, ' they had already pillaged and plundered the 
greater part of the said city, and violated women 
and girls in such numbers, that it w^as sad to see 
all the ill which the said bishop had done, in so 
short a time, to Toulouse.' But, indignation re« 



A.D. 1216.] THE ALBIGENSES. 141 

doubling the force of the citizens, the pillagers 
were driven out with great loss. Three times 
the count, with his cavalry, charged upon the 
people, in different quarters of the city, and three 
times he was repulsed, with great slaughter. At 
last he threatened to put to death the eighty pris- 
oners whom he had arrested. Fouquet, associat- 
ing with himself, the abbot of Saint Sernin, again 
entered the city as a mediator. The two prelates 
demanded of the Toulousians, to surrender their 
arms and fortresses, engaging, by oath, that on 
these conditions, the count should release their 
prisoners, and neither touch their persons nor 
their goods, but protesting, that they had no mer- 
cy to expect, if they persisted in their rebellion. 
The bishop, Fouquet, and the count Simon ap- 
pear, by this time, to have been so well known 
that their word inspired no confidence ; but the 
fearful danger of the hostages, the critical situa- 
tion of the city, and more than all, the constant 
repugnance of the people to believe that the 
lords and the priests would falsify their oaths, 
determined the Toulousians to submission. Mu- 
tual oaths were exchanged ; the arms were given 
up ; the fortresses were surrendered to the sol- 
diers of Montfort ; and when the citizens had 
thus deprived themselves of all means of resist- 
ance, Montfort put the most considerable persons 
amongst them in irons, and sent them, with the 
prisoners whom he had before seized, into the 
principal castles of the province, where they all 
perished, either by want or by a violent death. 
Then he commanded the rest of the citizens to 
pay him, before the 1st of the following Novem- 



142 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1217. 

ber, the exorbitant sum of thirty thousand marks 
of silver, in order to ransom their city from the 
flames, and their persons from a universal car- 
nage. There remained to the Toulousians no 
resource, and they were obliged to submit to these 
hard conditions.* 

1217. Simon de Montfort, who regarded all 
that his neighbours retained, as so much taken 
from himself, renewed the war in the following 
year, as well with Raymond Roger, count of 
Foix, with whom he disputed the restitutions he 
was enjoined to make, by the decisions of the 
council of Lateran, as with Raymond VII, then 
reduced to the possession of Provence. He be- 
sieged the son of the former, Roger Bernard, in 
Montgrenier, and, after six weeks, obhged him to 
capitulate.f He then engaged with the latter on 
the Rhone, and hanged all the inhabitants of the 
castle of Bernis, of which he had rendered him- 
self master. Nevertheless, the citizens of Beau- 
caire and of St. Gilles resisted all his attacks, 
although these two places were part of the con- 
cessions made to him by the council of Lateran, 
and confirmed by Philip Augustus. He w^as 
more fortunate in Valentinois, whither he after- 
wards carried the w^ar. He had obtained there 
several advantages, when he learned that the 
inhabitants of Toukmse, indignant at the cruelty 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 78—84. Petri Val. Cern . 
Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxxiii, p. 661. — Guil. de Podio Laurentii, 
cap. xxix, p. 683. Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, cli. ix, 
p. 292—294. 

t Hist. Albigens. Petri Val. Cern. cap. Ixxxiv, p. 661. Hist, 
de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xiii, p. 296. 



A.D. 1217.] THE ALBIGENSES. 143 

and perfidity with which they had been treated 
the preceding year, had secretly recalled, from 
Aragon, their count, Raymond VI, who on the 
13th of September, had entered into his capi- 
tal.* 

The return of count Raymond VI gave occa- 
sion for a touching manifestation of the national 
sentiments which were cherished by the inhabi- 
tants of the South of France. This descendant 
of an ancient house, long signalized in the service 
of the cross in the Holy Land, possessed no qual- 
ities which could properly speaking be regarded 
as grand or heroic. He had shown neither dis- 
tinguished talents nor force of character ; he had 
early been induced to consent to w^hat he disap- 
proved, and to inscribe his name amongst those 
of the crusaders who came to ravish his country, 
and who secretly nourished the project of con- 
quering his heritage. His submission to all the 
ecclesiastical censures, to all the outrages, to all 
the injustice, which the legates, the provincial 
councils, the pope, and the council of Lateran, 
had accumulated on his head, sufficiently indi- 
cated either his w^eakness, or his superstitious 
fears ; and his retreat from the Narbonnese cas- 
tle, and then from Toulouse, was perhaps the ef- 
fect of his timidity. But the people of all the 
province of Albigeois, did not forget that he had 
incurred the hatred of his oppressors, only by his 
indulgence towards them ; that he had abhorred 

* Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxxiv, Ixxxv, p. 662. Guill. de Podio 
Laurentii, cap. xxx, p. 683. Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 
84 et seq. Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xviii, p. 299. 



144 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1217. 

bloodshed and punishments, and that in spite of 
his promises, in spite even of the persuasion with 
which they had succeeded in inspiring him, that 
his religious duty, as well as his interest, demand- 
ed these persecutions, he had always checked the 
zeal of the executioners. His administration had 
been gentle ; public liberty in the cities, com- 
merce, manufactures, science, and poetry had 
made rapid advances by his assistance and en- 
couragement. If his civil character wanted force 
he had at least given proofs that he possessed the 
courage of the wrarior, and the talents of the 
general. His young son Raymond VH, already 
rendered illustrious by high exploits before his 
twentieth year, appeared, with a more experi- 
enced constancy, and a loftier character, to prom- 
ise a happier reign. 

But the two Raymonds became still more dear 
to the people, by their contrast with Simon de 
Montfort and the crusaders. It was not the zeal 
of the x\lbigensian heretics which was awakened 
for the house of Toulouse ; their church was 
drowned in blood, their race had disappeared, 
their opinions had ceased to influence society; 
but in their name the other parts of the popula- 
tion had been the objects of martyrdom. Hun- 
dreds of villages had seen all their inhabitants 
massacred, with a bUnd fury, and without the 
crusaders giving themselves the trouble to exam- 
ne whether they contained a single heretic. We 
cannot tell what credit to give to the numbers 
assigned for the armies of the cross, nor whether 
we may beheve that in the course of a single 
year five hundred thousand men were poured into 



A.D. 1217.] THE ALBIGENSES. 145 

Languedoc. But this we certainly know, that 
armies, much superior in number, much inferior 
in disciphne, to those which were employed in 
other wars, had arrived, for seven or eight suc- 
cessive years, almost without interruption, upon 
this desolated country ; that they entered it with- 
out pay, and without magazines, that they pro- 
vided for all their necessities with the sword, that 
they considered it as their right, to Hve at the 
expense of the country, and that all the harvests 
of the peasants, all the provisions and merchand- 
ise of the citizens, were, on every occasion, seiz- 
ed with a rapacious hand, and divided at discre- 
tion, amongst the crusaders. No calculation can 
ascertain, with any precision, the dissipation of 
w^ealth, or the destruction of human life, which 
were the consequences of the crusade against 
the Albigenses. There v/as scarcely a peasant 
who did not reckon in his family some unhappy 
one, whose life had been cut off by the sword of 
Montfort's soldiers ; not one but had repeatedly 
witnessed the ravaging of his property by them. 
More than three quarters of the knights and land- 
ed proprietors had been spoiled of their castles 
and fiefs, to gratify some of the French soldi 3rs — 
some of Simon de Montfort's creatures. Thus 
spoiled, they were named Faidits, and had the 
favor granted them of remaining in the country, 
provided they were neither heretics, nor excom- 
municated, nor suspected of having given an asy- 
lum to those who were so ; but thev were never 
to be permitted to enter a walled city, nor to en- 
joy the honor of mounting a war-horse. Every 
species of injustice, all kinds of affronts, perse- - 
9 



146 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1217. 

cutions of every name, had been heaped on the 
heads of the unhappy Languedocians, whom, 
since the crusade, it had been the custom to com- 
prehend under the general name of Albigen- 
ses. Simon de Montfort was, to them, the 
representative of the evil spirit ; the prototype 
of all the persecutions they had endured. The 
name of Raymond VI, on the contrary, was as- 
sociated with those happier times, when they en- 
joyed their possessions in peace, and when they 
could witness the daily increase of knowledge, 
industry, and liberty. 

The terror which Simon de Montfort had in- 
spired was, however, too profound to allow of 
the reception of Raymond VI, at Toulouse, 
without hesitation. He approached that city at 
the head of an army which he had raised in Spain, 
and which had been increased by the junction of 
the counts of Foix and of Cominges. Arrived 
at Salvetat, four leagues distant from his capital, 
he had put to flight a body of troops which, un-. 
der the standards of Montfort, had just pillaged 
the castle of Mazeres. He continued his march, 
and on the 13th of September found the gates 
of Toulouse open ; but, though he was equally 
wished for by almost all the inhabitants, the most 
timid had shut themselves up in the Narbonnese 
castle, and in different convents, with the wife 
and daughters-in-law of Simon de Montfort, that 
they might not be accused of having favored 
their ancient master. A new victory, obtfeied 
by Raymond VI over Guy de Montfort, Simon's 
brother, on the plains of Montolieu, emboldened 
the most fearful, and united all the citizens of 



A.D, 1217.] THE ALBIGENSES. 147 

Toulouse around their count. Soon, all the most 
valiant knights of Quercy, Albigeois, and Car- 
casses, who professed an ancient attachment to 
the house of St. Gilles, were seen entering the 
city with standards displayed, and trumpets sound- 
ing. Amongst them were remarked, Gaspard de 
la Barthe, Roger de Cominges, Bertrand-Jour- 
dain de Lille, Geraud de Gourdon, Lord of Car- 
aman, Bertrand de Montaigu and his brother 
Gaillard, Bertrand and Guitard de Marmande, 
Stephen de la Valette and Aymar his brother, 
Gerard de la Mothe, Bertrand de Pestillac, and 
Geraud d'Amanieu. Each of them was followed 
by all the serjeants-at-arms, on horseback, whom 
he could collect, and the entry of this brilhant 
cavalcade into the city was welcomed with trans- 
ports of joy ; and even those who had hitherto 
concealed themselves were now inspired with 
resolution.* Simon de Montfort, informed of 
this revolution, hastened to conclude a truce with 
the young count Raymond, to repass the Rhone, 
and return by forced marches towards Toulouse ; 
but a part of his army was composed of levies 
made in that country, and no Languedocian serv- 
ed him except through fear. As he advanced, 
and the news from Toulouse was spread amongst 
his soldiers, he saw himself deserted by all those 
whose hearts had remained faithful to their coun- 
try, and their ancient lord. Near to Basiege he 
met count Guy, his brother, who was coming to 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 88. Petri Val. Cern. 
Hist. Albig. cap. Ixxxv, p. 663. Guill. de Podio Laur. c, xxx, 
p. 683. Histoire gen, de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xix,p. 



148 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1217. 

join him. The two Montforts agreed to hasten 
an attack upon Toulouse, before the walls of that 
city had been rebuilt, and whilst the citizens hes- 
itated between affection and fear. They advanc- 
ed, therefore, with ladders, as far as the edge of 
the ditch ; but, at that moment, a discharge of 
cross-bows put them in disorder, and Guy de 
Montfort, with Guy his nephew, count of Bigorre, 
both fell, dangerously wounded. Simt)n was 
then compelled to renounce the project of taking 
the city by surprise, and he resolved, towards the 
end of September, to undertake a regular siege. 
In consequence of this resolution, he divided his 
troops between himself and his son Amaury, in 
order to attack the city, at the same time, on each 
side of the river. Nevertheless, he suffered him- 
self to be surprised by the count of Foix, was 
pursued as far as Muret, and near being drowned 
at the passage of the Garonne, in the very place 
which, four years before, had been signahzed by 
his most glorious victory, and was obliged to bring 
back his troops in front of the Narbonnese castle, 
where he joined his son.* 

Ail the other cities of Albigeois appeared ready 
to follow the example of Toulouse. The rebel- 
lion was, however, extinguished at Montauban, 
by the seneschal of Agenois, and the bishop of 
Lectoure, who commanded for Montfort : the city 
was pillaged and burned; but this act of severity 
only served to redouble the hatred of the Lan- 
guedocians against the French. Fouquet, bishop 
of Toulouse, was despatched into France with 



* Historia de los faicts de Tolcsa, p. 92. 



A.D. 1218.] THE ALBIGENSES. 149 

James de Vitry, the historian of the last combats 
of the Holy Land, to preach there a new crusade, 
whilst the countess of Montfort repaired to the 
court of Philip Augustus, to solicit his aid. Si- 
mon had recourse also to pope Honorius III, who, 
in fact, wrote to the king of Aragon, to dissuade 
him from an alliance with the count of Toulouse.* 
B,ut time was requisite before these different 
measures could form a new army for the heroes 
of the crusade. The siege, in the mean time, 
proved very tedious : it was prolonged through 
the winter, and lasted nearly nine months. The 
cardinal legate, who shared with Simon the con- 
duct of the army, never ceased reproaching him 
with his slowness, and attributed his want of suc- 
cess to a failure of zeal or courage. In the mean 
time, the besieged had the advantage in numbers 
and boldness over the assailants ; every day they 
darted from their walls upon the enemy, and 
caused them great loss. The 25th of June, 1218, 
the Toulousians, in a sortie, pushed towards a 
warlike machine, (a cat) which count Simon had 
just constructed. This count was at the church 
when he was informed that the besieged were in 
possession of his machine, and about to set fire 
to it. He wished, however, to finish the hearing 
of the mass before he proceeded to battle ; but, 
at the moment of ^he elevation of the host, he 
cried like Simeon, Let thy servant henceforth 
depart in peace, for my eyes have seen thy salva- 
tion. He called for his arms, put himself at the 

* Honorii III, Ep. 823, 826, 827 ; apud Raynaldi Ann. Ecclea. 
1217, § lviii,p. 269. 

V 



150 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1218. 

head of his old warriors, and once more repulsed 
the Toulousians. He was standing with his bat- 
talion, before the wooden tower which he had 
just reconquered, when an enormous stone, thrown 
by a machine from the wall of the city, struck 
him on the head, and extended him lifeless on 
the ground. The moment that his death was 
known by the Toulousians, a cry of joy resound- 
ed through the city. All ran to arms, and rushed 
upon the besiegers with redoubled fury. They 
drove them beyond their tents and equipages, 
took possession of a part of these effects, and 
destroyed the rest.* Amaury de Montfort col- 
lected together the scattered soldiers of his fath- 
er, received the homage of his knights, and their 
oath of fidelity as successor to Simon in the 
countship of Toulouse, and for a whole month 
obstinately persisted in the siege of the city, to 
which he endeavored to set fire. But his army 
was discouraged, and daily diminished in number, 
whilst the forces and the ardor of the besieged 
were augmented. He was at last obliged, on the 
25th of July, to determine on raising the siege, 
and to retire to Carcassonne, where he buried 
the body of his father.f 

* Petri Val, Cern. Hist. Albigens. cap. Ixxxvi, et ultim. p. 
664. Guil. de Podio, cap. xxx,p. 684. Historiade los laicts de 
Tolosa,p. 93. Hist.'deLanguedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xxviii, p. 303. 

fHist. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xxix, p. 105. Chronol. 
Robert! Altissiodor. p. 28.5. 



CHAPTER IV. 



[From A.D. 1218, to A.D. 1226.1 



The death of Simon de Montfort marks one of 
those epochs, not unfrequently met with in histo- 
ry, when the historians all forsake us at once ; so 
that although the events themselves continue 
their course, it becomes very difficult to exhibit 
their connexion. Curiosity, it is true, ought at 
the same time to diminish ; for when all the 
writers, as if by common consent, lay down their 
pens, the reason must be that either fatigue or 
exhaustion has reduced the nations, if not to an 
absolute stagnation, at least to a state of languor, 
in which nothing^ strongly excites the mind. 

The reign of Phihp Augustus had been, with 
regard to France, more fertile in historians than 
that of any of his predecessors. Bat Rigord, the 
first of these, does not pursue his recital beyond 
the year 1209. William 1' Armorique, the king's 
chaplain, and perhaps, the best amongst the writ- 
ers of the age, fiuishes his chronicle in 1219. 
Nevertheless he outUved Philip, and in the poem 
which he wrote also in honour of the same king, 
he relates his death and obsequies. Peter de 
Vaux-Cernay's history of the Albigenses ends 
with the year 1218, at the death of Montfort; 



152 CRUSADES AGAINST [ A.D. 1218. 

the anonymous author of Toulouse, in 1219 ; and 
the oriental history of James de Vitry, closes in 
1220, soon after the taking of Damietta ; so that, 
in every part, the curtain seemed to have fallen 
upon that great pohtical drama, which had at- 
tracted the eyes of Europe. 

1217 — 1221. The fifth crusade, which was 
commanded by the council of Lateran, formed, 
during several years, the grand subject of interest 
to Christendom ; on the one hand, it attracted to 
itself the whole crowd of knights and soldiers, 
who had been accustomed to subsist either by 
their hire or pillage, to seek the strong excite- 
ment of war, and to consider security and re- 
pose as a state of suffering ; and on the other, it 
procured some respite to the count of Toulouse. 
The warlike devotion of the French had resumed 
its first direction towards the east, and the efforts 
of the bishop Fouquet, to excite new fanatics to 
the massacre of the Albigenses, remained almost 
without effect. 

1218. The descent of the crusaders into Egypt 
was followed by more than a year of bloody com- 
bats, in which the Mussulmans had obtained, not- 
withstanding their obstinate resistance, such 
small success, that they offered to surrender Je- 
rusalem to the Christians, provided they would 
agree to evacuate Egypt. The pride of the le- 
gate Pelagiu, cardinal of Albano, who had un- 
dertaken to conduct the army, led him to reject 
these propositions. He thought he had made a val- 
uable acquisition when, on the 5th of November, 
1219, his army entered Damietta, on the walls of 
which no more defenders were to be seen. The 



A.D. 1218.] THE ALBIGENSES. 153 

priests, who accompanied the soldiers of the cross, 
wrote triumphantly to all Christendom, that eigh- 
ty thousand Musulmans had perished in the city ; 
that there remained only three thousand inhabi- 
tants when they took possession of it ; and that, 
with the exception of three hundred, whom they 
had reserved for the ransom of some Christian 
prisoners, these captives had themselves ceased 
to live. * 

1220 — 1221. Nevertheless if the capture of 
Damietta deUvered incalculable treasures to the 
cupidity of the Christians, the unburied bodies, 
which filled all the houseS; soon communicated 
to their soldiers a fearful pestilence. This bril- 
iant army rapidly melted away by mortality and 
desertion. John de Brienne, indignant at the in- 
solence of the legate, who had dared to excom- 
municate him, quitted Egypt to return to St. 
Jean d'Acre ; and at the same time a great num- 
ber of the crusaders set out for Europe. The 
legate Pelagius foolishly took that moment to 
conduct the remainder to the siege of Cairo, and 
obliged the king of Jerusalem to join him there. 
The communications of the Christian army with 
Damietta were soon cut off; all the dikes of the 
Nile were thrown down at the time of the inun- 
dation, and the Christians, without provisions, 
and with the water up to their waists, were in- 
debted to the generosity of Malek-el-Kamel for 
a capitulation, by which they surrendered Dami- 

* Bernardi Thesaur, cap, cc, p. 837. Matt. Par. p. 259. Ja- 
cob! de Vitriacoj lib. iii, p. 1141. Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1219» 
§ XV, p. 292. 



154 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1219. 

etta on the 30th of August, 1221, and abandon- 
ed Egypt. * 

1218 — 1219. This crusade, for the recovery 
of the Holy Land, by affording some respite to 
the count of Toulouse, enabled him to estabhsh 
himself in the government of the provinces of 
which he had regained possession. The young 
count Raymond VII, who had joined his father, 
was received into Agenois with the most lively 
expressions of joy, and he afterwards passed 
through the greater part of Quercy and Rovergue. 
In the month of November, 1218, he visited also 
the city of Nimes. At the same time, count 
Amaury de Montfort exerted himself to the ut- 
most, to retain his father's conquests. He caus- 
ed himself to be acknowledged, amongst other 
places, by Albi, a city which had given its name 
to these religious wars, and which had neverthe- 
less performed but a small part in them, f The 
court of Rome did not see, without regret, the 
destruction of that work which Innocent III had 
accomplished at so vast an expense. Honorius 
III took count Amaury under his most active 
protection, and, to establish him in his con- 
quests, diverted in his favour the half of the 
twentieth which had been imposed, in the 
name of the crusade, upon the clergy of 
France. % 

1219. Prince Louis, son of Philip Augustus, 

* Bernard! Thesaur. cap. ccvi, p. 843. Matt. Par. p. 264. 
Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1220. § Iv. p. 309; 1221, § x, p. 811. 
t Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xxxv, p. 397. 

fEpistolae Honorii III, in Duchesne Scr. torn. v. p. 854, 855. 
Raynaldi Annal. 1218, § 54, 55, p. 286. 



A.D. 1219.] THE ALBIGENSES. 155 

did not yield in fanaticism, or in hatred against 
the heretics, to any of the monks who were his 
father's subjects. He gladly took upon himself 
that new expedition against the Albigenses, to 
which the twentieth had been destined. Peter 
duke of Britanny, the count of SaintMauclerc, 
Paul, thirty other French counts, more than 
twenty bishops, and six hundred knights, took the 
cross to follow him, accompanied by ten thousand 
archers. With these forces, Louis joined count 
Amaury de Montfort, before the castle of Mar- 
mande which he was besieging, and the defence 
of which was undertaken by count Centulle d' 
Astarrac. * 

The old count Raymond VI had thrown all 
the cares of war and government upon his son, 
Raymond VII. Worn out with grief, and weak- 
ened by superstition, he feared, by resisting the 
church, to subject himself to anathemas still more 
terrible than those under which he had so long 
suffered. Nevertheless, the two counts of Tou- 
louse had endeavored in vain to induce Philip 
Augustus and his son to abandon the support of 
Montfort, and to accept of them for their feuda- 
tories, who were also their near relations and 
faithful vassals. Perhaps it was to leave the 
door open to these negociations, that Raymond 
VII would not, in the first instance, march to the 
assistance of the castle of Marmande. He pre- 
ferred extricating the count of Foix, Raymond 

* Guill. de Podio, cap. xxxii, p. 685. Historia de los faicts de 
Tolosa, p. 98, seq. Guil. Armoricus, p. 113. Philippidos, lib. 
xii, p. 276. Chronicon Turonese apud Marlene collectio am- 
plissima, torn. v. p. 106. Chronic. Guil. de Nangis, p. 507. 



156 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1219. 

Roger, from his difficulties, who was besieged in 
Basiege by two of Amaury's heutenants. Ray- 
mond VII, having joined the count of Foix, at- 
tacked his enemies in concert with him, and ob- 
tained a victory which was attributed to his per- 
sonal valour. In this victory of Basiege the 
principal officers of Amaury remained his prison- 
ers. * 

But, whilst Raymond was vanquishing the 
crusaders at Basiege, Louis and Amaury were 
pressing the siege of Marmande. They made 
an assault upon this place, by which they obtain- 
ed possession of the exterior works, and this in- 
duced the besieged to offer to surrender, if their 
lives and baggage were spared. ' I will receive 
you to mercy, said Louis, and suffer you to go 
away, carrying only your bodies with you.' 
The besieged accepted these conditions, and 
presented themselves immediately at the tent of 
the king's son, to salute him and surrender them- 
selves to him. But when the bishop of Saintes 
saw the count d'Astarrac and his knights en-, 
ter the tent of Louis, he said to the latter, ' Sire, 
my advice is, that you immediately kill and burn 
all these j^eople as heretics and apostates, and 
that none of them be left alive ; and then, that 
you do neither more nor less to those of the city,' 
The count of St. Paul and the duke of Britanny, 
however, exclaimed against this attempt of the 
man of God, in his holy zeal, to cause the son of 
the king of France to violate his word. The 



* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 96. Hist. Gen. de Lan- 
guedoo, liv. xxiii. cli. xli, p.310. 



A.D.1219.] THE ALBIGENSES 157 

archbishop of Auch added, that these prisoners 
and the inhabitants of Marmande were by no 
means heretics, any more than count Raymond, 
and that the church treated him very hardly, in 
not receiving him to mercy, when he submitted 
to its will. He reminded them, besides, that a 
great number of high barons and knights were 
prisoners at Toulouse, and that by violating a 
capitulation, to which they had sworn, they ex- 
posed them to terrible reprisals. ' My lords,' 
said prince Louis, ' I do not wish to injure the 
church, but neither ought I to do injury to the 
young count or his people.' He then permitted 
the captain CentuUe d'Astarrac who had com- 
manded at Marmande, to proceed with his gend- 
armes wherever he might think proper. But, 
during this time, Amaury de Montforthad enter- 
ed into Marmande, and had given command to 
execute the work which the bishop of Saintes had 
recommended in order to procure the blessing of 
God upon their arms. All the inhabitants, men, 
women, and children, to the number of five thou- 
sand, were massacred. Louis, after testifying 
some displeasure against Amaury, for havino- thus 
violated the royal promise, proceeded with him 
towards Toulouse, to lay siege to that capital. * 
The news of the massacre at Marmande, in- 
stead of damping the courage of the Toulousians, 
convinced them that they had no hope of deliv- 
erance, but from the most determined defence. 
Bertrand, cardinal priest of St. John and Paul 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. 99. Gail. Ar noricus, p. 
113. Prseclara Francorum facinora, p. 773, Histoire gen! de 
Languedoc, liv. xxiii et xiii, p. 311. 



158 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1219. 

whom Honorius had appointed in 1217 his legate 
in Albigeois, had sworn, ' that in the said Tou- 
louse, should remain neither man, woman, boy, 
nor girl, but that all should be put to death, with- 
out sparing any, old or young ; and that, in all 
the city, there should not remain one stone above 
another, but all should be demolished and thrown 
down.' This oath had been related to count 
Raymond, who, on the approach of the crusa- 
ders, sum.moned all his friends and allies to his 
defence. In fact, a thousand knights, well arm- 
ed and mounted, entered Toulouse to share his 
fortunes. Each gate, and each harhicom, or 
counterfort, was specially confided to three or 
four of the most illustrious knights, with their ser- 
vants at arms. The defence of the seventeeij 
gates was thus provided for, and each chief had 
sw^orn ' well and truly to defend his post, towards 
and against all, both for life and death.' The 
capitouls, or magistrates of Toulouse, on their 
parts, presented themselves before the young 
count and his knights, and declared'to him, ' that 
henceforth they abandoned all that they had, 
both bodies and goods, to those who had remain- 
ed with them to defend their city ; they besought 
him to spare them in nothing which should be 
needed, both for strangers, and familiars, and friends, 
and they would expect their wages to be paid ac- 
cording to their will.' * 

1219. These generous preparations for de- 



*Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, pp. 100, 101. Guil. de Po- 
dio, cap. xxxii, p. 685. Preeclara Fiancorum facinora, p. 773. 
Hist. gpn. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. xliii, p. 312, and note 
xix, p. 568. 



A.D.' 1220.] THE ALBIGENSES. 159 

fence were crowned with entire success. Louis 
arrived before Toulouse on the 16th of June, with 
Amaury de Montfort and the cardinal Bertrand : 
he very soon traced a line of circumvallation, and 
began the attack with vivacity, but found in every 
part a resistance superior to his means. He lost 
a great number of men, by the sword of the ene- 
my and by sickness.; very soon divisions crept 
into his camp, whilst the most zealous cried out 
treason, as soon as they heard any of the crusa- 
ders speak of moderation. In addition to this, 
the troops of Louis were engaged only for the 
feudal service of forty days ; this term was already 
expired, and he felt at last the impossibihty of re- 
taining them longer. He, therefore, resolved, on 
the first of August, to abandon or burn his war- 
like machines, to raise the siege, and retire with 
precipitation. * 

1220. The yoke of the house of Montfort 
and its lieutenants was become so much the more 
insupportable to the people of the South, as the 
religious zeal of the crusaders preserved them 
from no crime. The two brothers, Folcaud and 
Jean de Brigier, the most celebrated amongst 
Amaury's captains, were not less signalized by 
the infamy of their manners, than by their devo- 
tion. In their seraglio were found married women 
taken from the most respectable persons in the 
province : they had fixed at a hundred sols d'or 
the ransom of their prisoners, and they suffered 
all those who could not pay this exorbitant sum 

* Historia de los faicts de Tolosa, p. SOI. Chronic. Guil. de 
Nangis, p. 507. 



160 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1221. 

to perish with hunger at the bottom of a tower. 
Raymond VII had the happiness, in 1220, to 
take these two monsters prisoners, and he caused 
their heads to be cut off, as a punishment for so 
many crimes.* About the same time the cities of 
Montauban and Castelnaudary drove out Mont- 
fort's garrisons, and raised the standard of Ray- 
mond VII. Beziers also, with all its viscount- 
ship, returned to its allegiance to the young Tren- 
cavel, son of the ancient lord of that city, and 
to the count of Foix, his tutor. To stop the 
progress of rebeUion, Amaury came, at the be- 
ginning of July, 1220, with Guy, his brother, 
count of Bigorre, to lay siege to Castelnaudary. 
Guy de Bigorre was killed there the 27th of 
July, and his body was honorably sent to count 
Montfort, by Raymond VII who had shut him- 
self up in the place. Amaury obstinately per- 
sisted, for eight months, in the siege of Castel- 
naudary, and thus completely exhausted himself 
both of men and money. He was at last com- 
pelled to raise the siege in the beginning of March 
1221, and to retire to Carcassonne, which was 
almost the only place remaining to him of all his 
father's conquests. f 

1221 . About the middle of the summer, Amau- 
ry again took the field, and was with his army 
at Clermont upon the Garonne, when he was in- 
formed that the inhabitants of Agen had entered 
into a treaty with the house of Toulouse. He 

*Guil. de PodioLaur. cap. xxxiii, p. 685. 
f Guil. de Podio, cap. xxxi, p. 684. Prjeclara Francor. faci- 
^ nora, p. 772. Hisl. Gen. de Languedoc, iiv. xxiii, ch. xlvii, p; 
314. and note xxi, p. 569. 



A.D1221.] THE ALBIGENSES. 161 

sent for their consuls to meet him on the first of 
August ; he granted them a complete amnesty 
for all the faults they might have committed ; he 
engaged also, for the future, to grant them the 
greatest privileges, but could inspire them with 
no confidence. The people had learned what 
this count was capable of, when he was the 
strongest, and they regarded this moderation as 
only a proof of his weakness. Before the end 
of the month of August, 1221, Agen had opened 
its gates to Raymond VII.* 

Cardinal Bertrand felt it a reproach to himself 
that, during his legation in Albigeois, these prov- 
inces, where the church had shed so much blood, 
had all returned to their ancient masters. The 
faithful appeared disgusted with the crusaders ; 
the bishops could no longer succeed in exciting 
fanaticism ; the legate therefore endeavored to 
establish a body more completely devoted to the 
destruction of the heretics and the lukewarm. 
With the authority of pope Honorius HI,- he in- 
stituted the order of the holy faith of Jesus 
Christ, to combat and annihilate those who do 
not profess an ardent faith for the church and a 
bhnd obedience to all the secular powers. We 
have the letters patent of Peter Savaric, humble 
and poor master of the militia of the order of 
the faith of Jesus Christ, ds.ted at Carcassonne, 
9th February, 1221, by which he professes that 
the vows of his order are ' to promise aid and 
succor to Amaury de Montfort and his heirs, for 

*Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. Ivi, p. 318. Preuves, 
p. 271: Privilege de Raymond VII, a la ville d'Agen. 

10 



162 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1221. 

the defence of his person and domains ; and to 
engage to discover and destroy heretics, and reb- 
els ao-ainst the church, and all others, Christians 
or infidels, who shall make war agamst that 
count.'* In the events of our days, we have 
seen the Santafedisd, or knights of the holy 
faith, figure in Italy and Spain, professing the 
same doctrines, engaged by similar vows, and 
whose actions, as well as their language, recalto 
mind the crusade of Albigeois. 

Honorius III did not depend alone upon the 
knights of the faith to succor Montfort. He ad- 
dressed himself afresh to Philip and Louis, to 
whom he granted, as the price of an expedition 
against the Albigenses, a new twentieth, to be 
levied upon the clergy. But Louis having, with 
this money, collected an army, conducted it into 
the domains of the king of England in Aquhaine 
and Poitou, instead of attacking the count of 
Toulouse. Both French and English historians 
are equally silent with regard to the events of 
this campaign.! Honorius also addressed the 
different bishops of France, and particularly the 
archbishop of Sens, of Rheims, and of Boufges, 
engaging them to inquire after, to seize, and burn, 
those of the Albigensian heretics, who had sought 
a refuge in their provinces. J This severity oblig- 
ed a great number of the unfortunate Languedo- 
cians who were dispersed to great distances, to 

*Heliot, Histoire des ordres religieux, torn, viii, p. 286, et 
seq. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv, xxiii, cli. lii, p. 816. Ray- 
naldi Ann. Eccles. 1221 § xll, p. S16. ; 

t Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. liv. p. 317. 

4:Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1221, § xliii, p. 316. 



A.D. 1222.] THE ALBIGENSES. 163 

return to their country, in the hope that they 
should be protected by the same men who, on 
every side, had risen against the house of Mont- 
fort and the church. 

1222. In reahty, during the year 1222, the 
sectaries, who had been driven out for their faith, 
found themselves sufficiently numerous in the 
places where their fathers had suffered, to give 
them the hope of renewing their instructions, and 
of organizing their church. If we may credit 
the registers of the inquisition at Toulouse, about 
a hundred of the principal Albigenses held a 
meeting at a place named Pieussan in Rasez, and 
Guillabert de Castres, one of their ancient preach- 
ers, who had escaped the researches of the fanat- 
ics, presided. This assembly provided chiefs 
for the desolated churches, the ancient directors 
of which had perished in the flames. Three new 
preachers, described in these registers by the 
titles of bishop of Rasez, of elder son, and of 
younger son, received, from Guillabert de Castres, 
imposition of hands, and the kiss of peace. The 
monks of Saint Dominic abandoned, at this mo- 
ment, by the secular power, were reduced to the 
necessity of only noting these circumstances in 
their books, against the day of vengeance.^ 

In the mean time Amaury de Montfort was 
losing the hope of entering into possession of his 
father's conquests. The inhabitants of the small 
number of castles which still remained to him, 
were watching an opportunity to revolt and signal- 
ise their vengeance by the massacre of some of 

*Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, ch. lvii,p. 319. 



164 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1222. 

his friends. Montfort could not reckon on the 
fidelity of any man who spoke the Provencal 
language, whilst the sword was always suspended 
over the head of all his servants who used that 
of the French. His countship of Montfort, and 
all his patrimonial possessions were exhausted of 
men and money ; that fanaticism appeared ex- 
tinct which had furnished so many recruits to his 
father. All the bulls of Honorius III were no 
longer able to bring a single crusader into Lan- 
guedoc, and all those who wished to engage in 
the sacred war, either passed into Egypt or to 
the Holy Land. Discouraged, disgusted with 
the war, affrighted at the universal hatred of 
which he saw himself the object, Amaury sent 
the bishops of Nismes and of Beziers, to Philip 
Augustus, to offer him the cession of all the 
conquests of the crusaders in Albigeois ; and at 
the same time made application to the pope, for 
his assistance in obtaining from the king the most 
favorable conditions.* 

Honorius III wrote to Philip Augustus, on the 
14th of May, 1222, advising him to accept the 
offers of Montfort ; and representing to him, that 
it was his bounden duty towards Christendom, to 
extirpate the heresy which was beginning again 
to spring up in his kingdom ; assuring him at the 
same time, that if he sent a powerful army into 
the South, he would be recompensed for the pains 
he should take to purge the land of these secta^ 
ries, by the acquisition of the rich fiefs which 
were offered to him by the church. f But Phihp 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, llv. xxiii, ch, Ix, p. 320^ 
t Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1222, § xliv, p. 325. 



A.D. 1222.] THE ALBIGllNSES. 165 

Augustus had at this period lost all the spirit of 
enterprise and the activity of his youth ; he was 
frozen with age and sickness ; he held out the 
possibility of an approaching war with England, 
since his truce with Henry III would terminate 
in 1223, and refused to enter into any negociation 
either with Montfort or the pope.* 

Whilst these things were going on, Raymond 
VI was almost suddenly taken from his family by 
a malady with which he was seized in the month 
of August, at Toulouse. From the first attack 
of this unknown disease, he lost the use of his 
speech. He preserved, however, sufficient recol- 
lection to give many signs of contrition ; amongst 
other things, he was frequently seen, during his 
agony, to kiss the cross upon the mantle of the 
hospitalers of St John, with which he was cov- 
ered. He had devoted himself to this order, at 
the time of the persecution of which he had been 
the object, and all the misfortunes he had expe- 
rienced had not sufficed to extinguish his devo- 
tion. He had given abundant alms to the priests 
and the monasteries ; he had shown himself scru- 
pulous in the performance of all the practices of 
piety ; and when he was under excommunication 
he was seen to remain for a long time on his knees 
in prayer, at the doors of the churches which he 
dared not enter. But, the monks reproached 
him with feeling some pity for the heretics ; with 
taking no dehght in the torments which they 
inflicted upon them ; with having even frequently 
withdrawn the sectaries from punishment. They 

t Preuves de I'Histoire de Languedoc, no. cxlii, p. 276. 



166 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1223. 

persecuted him for his compassion, not only dur- 
ing his Hfe, but even for- ages after his death. 
His son could never obtain the honors of sepul- 
ture for his body, but his coffin was deposited 
near the burial ground of St. John of Toulouse, 
waiting the permission of the church for its inter- 
ment. It was still there in the fourteenth centu- 
ry ; but, as it was only of wood, and no one took 
care for its preservation, it was broken, and his 
bones dispersed before the sixteenth century. 
The skull alone of Raymond VI was long preserv- 
ed in the house of the hospitalers of St. John of 
Toulouse.* 

1223. The death of the count of Toulouse 
was speedily followed by that of Raymond Roger 
count of Foix, the bravest of his vassals, and who 
had perhaps the most contributed to the recovery 
of his states. The count of Foix had not em- 
braced the faith of the Albigenses, but it appears 
that his wife and many persons of his family be- 
longed to this sect, and that he had himself, if 
we may believe the registers of the inquisition, 
sometimes assisted at the conventicles of the sec- 
taries, but without making abjuration. He was 
then, in the eyes of the church, more guilty than 
the count of Toulouse, but they had, notwith- 
standing, treated him with more indulgence, be- 
cause the conquest of his country was judged 
more difficult. He died in the end of March, or 
the beginning of April, of the fatigues he had 

*Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv, xxiii, ch. Ixiii, p. 322 et seq., 
et note 37, p. 593. Guil. de Podio Laur. ch. xxxiv, p. 686. Ber- 
nardi Guidonis Vita Honorii Papse III, p. 569. 



A.D. 1223.] THE ALBIGENSES. 167 

endured at the siege of Mirepoix, which enven- 
omed an ulcer that had long tormented him.* 
The death of these two counts did not, however, 
weaken the cause of toleration. Raymond VII 
was at least twenty-five years old, at his father's 
death. He was beloved by his subjects, whom 
he had governed for many years ; he inherited 
the talent of his ancestors for w^ar, and added to 
it more firmness of character than his father pos- 
sessed, and more skill in government. Roger 
Bernard, who succeeded to the sovereignty of 
the countship of Foix, had., on his part, signaliz- 
ed himself, for ^ long time, and on many occa- 
sions, against the crusaders, and he showed him- 
self neither less vahant, nor less attached to the 
count of Toulouse, than Raymond Roger.f 

1223. These two princes, therefore, having 
resolved entirely to drive Amaury de Montfort 
from the province, besieged, in the spring of 
1223, la Penne in Agenois, and Verdun upon 
the Garonne. The pope had sent a new legate 
into Albigeois, Cardinal Conrad, bishop of Porto, 
who wrote to all the bishops of France, to de- 
mand succors, whilst Amaury approached la Penne 
with the hope of intimidating the two counts, 
but was soon obliged to feel the inferiority of his 
forces. As his troops were deserting him, and 
he ran the risk of falling into the hands of his 
enemy, he made propositions of peace. A 

*Hist- Gen. deLanguedoc, liv. xxiii,ch. Ixx, p. 330. Extraits 
de I'Archive de I'Inquisition de Carcassonne, Pi'euves ibid. p. 
437 et seq. Bernardi Guidonis Vita Honorii III, p. 569. 

t Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiii, p. 328—330. 



168 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1223. 

thought was even entertained of causing Ray- 
mond VII to marry a sister of Amaury, and, upon 
these overtures, a truce was signed between the 
two parties. Raymond, as confiding as he was 
loyal, hesitated not upon this assurance, to put 
himself into the hands of the hereditary enemy 
of his family. He entered into Carcassonne, and 
passed a whole day with count Amaury. Through 
a pleasantry, which served still to increase his 
danger, perceiving that his attendants were alarm- 
ed for his imprudence, he caused them to be in- 
formed that he had been arrested, during the 
night, at Carcassonne, and upon this news, all 
his guard whom he had left without the city took 
to flight. The two counts only laughed at the 
terror of these soldiers. They separated hke 
men of honor ; but, not being able to accomplish 
a reconciliation, recommenced hostihties at the 
end of the armistice.* 

1223. At this same epoch. Cardinal Conrad 
convoked a provincial council, in the city of Sens, 
to deliberate on the affairs of the Albigenses ; 
and one of the motives which he alleged for the 
church putting itself in a posture of defence 
against the heretics was, that, according to his 
statement, they had set up a chief or pope, who 
had established himself upon the frontiers of 
Bulgaria, of Dalmatia, of Croatia, and of Hun- 
gary. He added, that a great number of Christ- 
tians, and even bishops, in those countries, had 
ackowledged his authority ; that the dispersed 
Albigenses had resorted to him, and received his 

* Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxiv, p. 686. 



A.D. 1223.] THE ALBIGENSES. 169 

decisions as oracles ; and that one of them, Bar- 
thelemi de Carcassonne, had returned into his 
country with the authority of a legate, and arro- 
gated to himself the right of naming new bish- 
ops.* 

There is reason to believe, in fact, that the 
opinions of the Paulicians had been, for the first 
time, spread in the West, through Bulgaria. 
The letter of Cardinal Conrad indicates, that 
there still existed a connection between the sec- 
taries of the two countries, and that those of the 
Sclavonian language, to whom, two centuries lat- 
er, we are indebted for the reformation of John 
Huss, and Jerome of Prague, had opened an 
asylum, and offered succors, to the persecuted 
Albigenses. But, it is not probable that the sec- 
taries had given themselves the same organization 
as the church of Rome, which they opposed. 
The papists could conceive of no church without 
a pope ; but he, whom they imagined in Bulga- 
ria, and even whose nam.e they do not tell us, 
disappeared without leaving a successor. 

The chief object which the cardinal legate, 
and Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, had proposed 
to themselves in the convocation of this council 
was, to alarm the conscience of Philip Augustus, 
and to determine him to send, at last, a powerful 
army against the Albigenses, and thus to accept 
the offers of the count of Montfort ; but Philip 
seemed to have contracted, in the last years of 
his life, a political timidity, which accorded with 

♦Matt. Paris, p. 267. Martene Thesaur. anecdot. t. i, p. 900. 
Concilior. Labbei, t. xi, p. 288, et seq. Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 
1223, § xxxix, p. 338. 



170 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1223. 

the progress of his age, and the decHne of his 
health ; and which caused him to reject every 
occasion of aggrandizing himself at the expense 
of his neighbors. William de Pny-Laurent as- 
sures us, upon the authority of Fouquet, the 
atrocious bishop of Toulouse, that Phihp said to 
the bishop — ' I know that after my death, the 
clergy will prevail upon my son Louis to take 
part in the affairs of the Albigenses ; and, as he 
is weak and delicate, he will not be able to bear 
the fatigues, and will die in a little time. Then 
the kingdom will fall into the hands of women 
and children, and will be thereby much endan- 
gered.' This prophecy, nevertheless, which 
afterwards was often repeated, may have been 
given after the event.* 

At the time when the bishop Fouquet was 
impressing, upon Philip Augustus, the necessity 
of putting all the Toulousians to the sword, it 
became necessary to attend mAich more to the 
politics of his successor, than to those of the 
reigning monarch. A quatran fever which had 
commenced towards the middle of the summer 
of 1222, was continually reducing the strength 
of the king. It lasted him during a whole year, 
but did not prevent him from continuing his short 
journeys to inspect the works which he had or- 
dered. ' Philip Augustus loved architecture, and 
monuments ; many of the kings his predecessors 
had built churches, but he was the first to orna- 
ment France with civil architecture. The com- 
munes had, for a long time, surrounded them^ 

* Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxiv, p. 687. 



A.D. 1223.] THE ALBIGENSES. ITl 

selves with walls for their own defence ; the lords 
had, on their part, carefully fortified their dwell- 
ings ; whilst, on the contrary, the cities, towns, 
and villages, which belonged to the crown, had 
been scandalously neglected. Philip undertook 
to surround them all with walls ; he did it howev- 
er with a respect to the rights of individuals, to 
which they had not been accustomed on the part 
of the receivers of the revenue ; for he always 
purchased the houses which it was necessary to 
pull down, and the land that was wanted for the 
public service. He was able, during the forty 
years of his reign, to finish all these walls, and 
thus gave a guarantee, both to the safety of the 
state and to the police,- which had not been 
known before this time.* 

These immense undertakings, did not exhaust 
the treasures of Phihp Augustus. He had es- 
tablished order in the finances, and as his reign 
had been the epoch of a prodigious increase in 
the population, industry, commerce, and agricul- 
ture of France, the royal revenues had augment- 
ed with that prosperity, But the king's treasure 
was regarded as his private and personal property. 
All that he had economised, all that he had drawn 
from the people, and had not employed in govern- 
ing them, belonged so entirely to himself, that far 
from being obliged to leave it to his country, he 
did not even feel an obligation to leave it to his 
children. It is true, that the priests had taken 
care to inculcate this doctrine, of exclusive pro- 
perty, into the hearts of kings. They had all 

* Guil. Armorici Philippidos, lib. xii, p. 279. 



172 CRUSADES AGAINST Fa.D. 1223. 

agreed to tell them, that \i, at any time, princes 
were guilty of overwhelming with their extortions 
the poor contributors, of ruining widows and or- 
phans, or of refusing afterwards to the public ne- 
cessities the money which they had collected by 
iniquitious measures, one way of compensation 
was still offered them, a way which would change 
all their Crimes into so many virtues, and would 
thus insure their salvation, by the very conse- 
quences of their evil deeds ; this was to dispose, 
in favour of the church, of all the money they 
had thus accumulated. Philip Augustus made 
his will, upon these principles,* in the month of 
September, 1222. He named for his executors, 
Guarin, bishop of Senlis, Barthelemy de Roye, 
and brother Aymard, treasurer of the temple, and 
assigned to these testamentary executors twenty- 
five thousand marks of silver, which then equal- 
led fifty thousand livres, and which, at this day, 
would amount to twelve hundred thousand, f that 
they might, according to their consciences, make 
restitution whenever the king had done any in- 
justice. Philip -Augustus bequeathed to the king 

* Rex cum repletus esset divitiis, says the canon, author of the 
chronicle of Tours, Christum in his hseredem suum constituens, 
inauditciraunera elargivit, t. xviii, p. 803. 

f Philip says expressly, in this will, that the mark was worth 
two livres, or forty sous of Paris. The li vre of half a mark or four 
ounces of silver, was then equal to the present louis; for the crown 
of six francs weighs an ounce. This was the metallic value, but 
its value in exchange was much greater, since we see, by the same 
testament, that a priest could be decently maintained for twelve 
livres of Paris equal to 288 francs per year. It is probable that 
these 288 francs would procure as many enjoyments as we might 
obtain, at this day, for 600 francs. Testamentum Philippi in Ar- 
chivio regio, Pluteo i, 503, No 1, annexed in a note toGuillelmu* 
Armoricus, p. 114. 



A.D. 1223.] THE ALBIGENSES. 173 

of Jerusalem, to the hospitalers and templers, fifty 
thousand rtiarks of silver each, that this king, and 
those two mihtary orders, might each maintain, 
in return, for three years, one hundred additional 
knights in the service of the Holy Sepulchre ; he 
assigned to them also considerable sums to assist 
in preparing them to pass the sea the year fol- 
lowing. He bequeathed twenty thousand livres 
to Amaury de Montfort, to be employed in the 
extirpation of the heresy of the Albigenses ; for 
it was neither from scruple of conscience, nor 
from a sentiment of humanity, that he had him- 
self always refused to march against those secta- 
ries. * He bequeathed to the abbey of Saint 
Denys, all his crowns and jewels ; to the abbey 
of Saint Victor, which he had built near the 
bridge of Charenton, two thousand hvres, and 
two hundred and forty livres annually, which 
were to suffice for the maintenance of twenty 
priests ; he left twenty-one thousand livres to the 
poor of Paris, and only ten thousand to Isemburge 
his wife, and ten thousand to his natural son Phihp. 
The sum which he destined to his eldest 
son remained blank in his will, apparently that 
he might receieve what remained in his treasury 
after all his other legacies had been paid.f 

1223. In spite of the king's malady, the coun- 
cil which had been convoked at Sens to instmct 
him by its advice, assembled there in July, 1223. 
It was composed of six archbishops, and of twenty 
bishops, with a great number of abbots. Fou- 

* The legacy to Montfort mentioned by Arnioricus p. 116 was 
probably added in a codicil. It is not found in the will. 
t Guil. Armoricus, p. 114. 



174 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1223. 

quet bishop of Toulouse was the only one of the 
Albigensian prelates who Avas present. Philip 
Augustus had promised to be there, but perceiv- 
ing that his declining health would render the 
journey dangerous, he very soon demanded that 
the council should be transferred to Paris, and 
set out himself on his return to the capital. The 
violence of his illness retained him at Mantes, 
where he died the 14th of July, 1223, in the fif- 
ty-eighth year of his age, and the forty-fourth of 
his reign. The prelates assem.bled for the coun- 
cil added to the pomp of his obsequies ; the le- 
gate and the archbishop of Rheims, being unwil- 
ling to cede to each other the supreme rank, of- 
ficiated at the same time, at two different altars. 
After this unusual ceremony, Philip Augustus 
was interred at Saint Denis. * 

Count Amaury de Montfort profited by the 
truce which he had recently concluded with the 
count of Toulouse, to attend the council of Sens, 
and he was therefore at court at the accession of 
Louis VIII. Louis, before he set out for Rheims 
paid to Amaury ten thousand marks, in part of 
what his father had bequeathed to that lord, to 
assist in maintaining his garrisons in Albigeois ; 
and at the same time hinted to him, that he should 
be disposed to make an exchange with him, for 
the conquests made by the crusaders, and engag- 

* Guil. Armor, p. 116 et finis. Philippidos, lib. xii, p. 280, 
usque ad finem. Chronique de St. Denys, p. 416. Matt. Paris, 
p. 267, et Hist, de France, p. 758. Bernardi Guidonis Vita Hon- 
orii III, p. 569. Guil. deNangis Chron. p. 513. Raynaldi An- 
nal. Eccles. ann. 1223, § xxxiii, p. 332. Radulphi Coggeshale 
Chron. Ang. p. 116. Rog. de Hovedea, cont. p. 187. Anu. 
Waverleiens,p. 209. Chrwnic. Turon. p. 303. 



A.D. 1224.] THE ALBIGENSES. 175 

ed him to break off all negociation with Ray- 
mond VII. After having received this subsidy, 
the count of Montfort set off for Carcassonne.* 
When he arrived there, that city was already 
attacked by the counts of Toulouse and of Foix, 
who had brought with them the young Trenca- 
vel, then sixteen years of age, the only son of 
that Raymond Roger, viscount of Beziers and 
of Carcassonne, whom Simon had so barbarously 
put to death. Amaury, having collected an army 
with the money he had received from Louis 
VIII, compelled the Languedocian lords to raise 
the siege ; but his money was soon expended, 
and the mercenaries assembled under his stand- 
ards, declared that their services should cease 
when their pay w^as discontinued. In vain did 
Amaury solicit, by turns, the bishops of the prov- 
ince, the citizens of Narbonne, and his own 
knights ; in vain he offered to pledge his French 
domains, and even his person ; he could neither 
find money, nor retain his soldiers. He was after 
a short time again shut up in Carcassonne, by 
the counts of Toulouse, and of Foix ; and losing, 
at last, all hopes of resistance, he signed, on the 
14th of January, 1224, a convention with them, 
by which he engaged to use all his efforts to re- 
concile the two counts with the church and the 
king of France. He delivered to them, by this 
treaty, Carcassonne, Minerva, and Penne d' 
Agenois ; he stipulated an armistice, of two 
months, for six small places that still belonged to 

*Epistol3e Honorii III ad Ludovicurn ; apud Duchesne torn. \, 
p. 860. 



176 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1224, 

him in the province, with a guarantee for the 
rights of individuals, acquired during the v^^ar, 
and received ten thousand silver marks for the 
expenses of his journey. The next day, 15th of 
January, 1224, he set out for the North of France 
with all the knights devoted to his fortune, aban- 
doning forever the country where his house had 
reigned fourteen years.* 

1224. The young Trencavel, still under the 
government of the count of Foix, took possession 
of the four viscountships of Carcassonne, of Be- 
ziers, of Rasez, and of Albi, over which his fath- 
er had reigned. But, at the same time, the arch- 
bishop of Narbonne, and the bishop of Nismes, of 
Usez, of Beziers, and of Agde, retired to Mont- 
pellier ; either fearing the vengeance of those to 
whom they had occasioned so much evil, or wish- 
ing to give themselves the appearance of being 
persecuted. From thence, they wrote, eight 
days after, to Louis VIII, begging him not to 
confirm the peace which had been negociated : 
* Not to permit the unclean spirit, who bad been 
driven from the province of Narbonne, by the 
ministry of the roman church and his own, to 
return, in all his power, with seven spirits more 
wicked than himself, but rather to employ the 
power which he had received from God, in ac- 
quiring the territory which the church had offer- 
ed him.' f 

*Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv, xxiii, ch. Ixxxi, p. 336. Le 
traite aux preuves, no. 148, p. 285 et la lettre de cinque eveques 
au Roi, p, 286. 

t Episcoporum Epistolne, Preuves a I'Hist. de Languedoc, no. 
150, p. 289. 



A.D. 1224.] THE ALEIGENSES. 177 

Louis VIII appeared, indeed, eager to signal- 
ise the commencement of his reign, by the con- 
quest of Albigeois. Amaury de Montfort, having 
arrived at Paris, ceded to him, in the month of 
February, all the privileges, which the church 
had granted to his father and himself, over the 
countries conquered by the crusaders. He ex- 
changed them forthepost of constable of France, 
which Louis promised to Amaury.* But this 
treaty was conditional, and was not to have effect 
unless the Roman church should accept the con- 
ditions which the king had offered by the arch- 
bishop of Bourges and the bishops of Langres and 
-ofChartres.f 

The church appeared to desire, with so much 
ardour, the extirpation of the house of Saint 
Gilles, and of all who had shewn any tolerance 
towards the heretics, that Louis had no doubt of 
obtaining from the pope, if he took the cross, all 
the advantages which he demanded for a recom- 
pense. He required that the crusade should be 
preached anew throughout all France, with the 
express mention, that the indulgences should he 
fully equal to those which might be gaiued by 
the crusade to the Holy Land. He required, at - 
the same time, that those who would not follow 
hina, from devotion^ should be obliged to do it in 
the fulfilment of their feudal duties, as if the king- 
dom v/ere subject to a foreign invasion ; for no 
invasion, said he, is more fearful, than that of her- 
esy. Consequently, he demanded that all the 

* Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. jpcxiv, p. 687. 
fCessio Amalrici Preuves Languedoc. No. 152, p. 290. 
11 



178 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1224. 

French barons who refused, on this occasion, to 
accomphsh the service of their fief, should be ex- 
communicated, and their lands put under an in- 
terdict. To be more sure of the direction of 
these ecclesiastical thunders, he demanded that 
the archbishop of Bourges should be assigned 
him as cardinal legate, with full powers over Al- 
bigeois. He required, the pope, by letters pa- 
tent, to deprive, for ever, the count of Toulouse, 
the viscount of Carcassonne, and of Beziers, and 
all those who should be allied to them, or should 
make war in concert w^ith them, of all the fiefs 
they might have in the kingdom of France, and 
to invest, with them, for ever, the king and his 
descendants : lastly, he required that, in order to 
finish this conquest, the church should guarantee 
to him, for ten years, the truce then existing with 
the king of England, and should, during the same 
time, pay him sixty thousand hvres of Paris each 
year ; declaring, that if all these conditions were not 
accepted, he should consider himself under no ob- 
ligation to pass into Albigeois.* The popes 
have, in general, preferred the European cru- 
sades, which tended directly to extend their au- 
thority, to those of the Holy Land, which had 
rather augmented than diminished the independ- 
ence of the human mind. Nevertheless, they 
could not set themselves in open opposition to the 
opinion of Christendom ; and besides, they fre- 
quently shared the fanaticism which they had 
tended to excite. At the very moment when 
Honorius HI received the propositions of Louis 

* Petitio ad Papain pro reg Preuves de I'Hist. de Languedoc, 
No. 155, p. 292. 



A.D. 1224.] THE ALBIGENSES. 179 

VIII, he had well-founded hopes of repairing, by 
a new crusade, those disasters of the Holy Land 
which had so recently tarnished the glory of his 
pontificate. The emperor Frederic II had been 
engaged to Yolande of Jerusalem, daughter of 
Jean de Brienne, and the kingdom of Judea had 
been promised for her portion. Frederic , who 
was sovereign not only of Germany and Upper 
Italy, but of Sicily and Calabria, could, with more 
ease than any other European prince, transport 
the crusaders from his own ports to that of Saint 
Jean d'Acre. He had embraced with ardour the 
project of conquering Syria, to add it to his other 
possessions ; and on the 5th of March had writ- 
ten to the pope, from Catena, a long letter, both 
to give him an account of his preparations, and to 
engage him to remove the obstacles which the 
situation of France and England interposed to the 
renewal of the sacred war. ' The king of Jerusa- 
lem,' said Frederic, ' has recently written to us 
from Germany, that he was going to quit that 
country, seeing that he had there advanced but 
little the interests of the Holy Land. In truth, 
the missionaries who preach the cross there are 
so slandered by every one, both because they 
are men of the lowest rank, and because they v 
have no authority to grant indulgences, that no- 
body will listen to them. Other letters, that we 
have received from different parts of the world, 
and from the highest and most powerful person- 
ages, state, that we are accused, as well as the 
church, of proceeding with indifference in that af- 
fair. The grandees of France and England, as 
we have been informed by the king of Jerus?^- 



180 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1224. 

lem, do not appear desirous of taking the cross, 
unless a long truce be concluded between the 
two kingdoms, and they are assured of going and 
coming in peace. Many of the most powerful 
amongst those that have taken the cross, even 
pretend that they have dispensations from you 
from going to the Holy Land.'^ 

Honorious III had already given his assent to 
the propositions of Louis VIIl, and the prelates 
who were his ambassadors, had returned to 
France, when the pope received the letter of 
Frederic II. He could not doubt that the preach- 
ers of the crusade in Albigeois, were those who 
had traduced the characters of the vendors of in- 
dulgences, and that the persons whose service in 
the Holy Land he was reproached for having dis- 
pensed with, were such as he had encouraged to 
convert their vows into an expedition of forty 
days on the banks of the Garonne* How could 
he, without dishonouring himself, take this mo- 
ment for publishing, that such a short campaign, 
without expense, difficulty, or danger, was a work 
as meritorious as the crusade which the Emperor 
was preparing to lead against the enemies of 
Christianity? The extent of the preparations 
that Louis was making, for the war against the 
Albigenses, sufficiently showed that he would not 
, suffer a single Frenchman to pass to the Holy 
Land, if that war continued. Honorious therefore 
despatched the cardinal bishop of Porto, to Louis, 
recommending him to use the greatest diligence, 

"^Epist. Frederici II, inRaynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1224, § iv~ixji 
;p. 337 seq. 



A.D. 1224.] THE ALBIGENSES. 181 

to communicate the Emperor's letter, to withdraw 
the consent he had given to their treaty, and to 
inform him that the count of Toulouse, terrified 
at the preparation of the king of France, had con- 
sented to submit, entirely, to the church, by 
purging his province of heretics, according to the 
mode which the mercy of the inquisition had adop- 
ted. The good of the Holy Land, added the 
pope, demanded, that he should be contented 
with these guarantees, and that he should grant 
peace to Raymond VII, in the hope that he 
would henceforth act with equal vigour and sin- 
cerity.* 

Louis VIII thoaght that he had made himself 
sure of all the support of the church ; he had al- 
ready written to those communes whose assist- 
ance he reckoned most upon, to announce to 
them that he would march with his army three 
weeks after Easter, and requiring them to support 
him vigorously.! He was, therefore, exceeding- 
ly enraged, when he saw himself thus abandoned 
by the pope : he wrote to him with much ill hu- 
mour, and having in his letter recapitulated all 
that he had done already at the persuasion of the 
church, he finished wdth these words : ' We have 
rephed to the cardinal bishop of Porto that since 
the lord pope would not, at present, attend to 
our reasonal demands, we considered ourselves 
discharged from the burden of this business, 



*Hor,orii HI eplst. apuJ T^r^^^^^' ^om. v. No. xyii, p. 895. 
+ Epist. Lud. VIII Narbonnensibus rtJuTr,^ ^^ 1 histoire de 



Languedoc, JVo. cliii, p. 291. 



182 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1224. 

and we have protested as much pubhcly before 
all the prelates and barons of France.' * 

Raymond VII endeavoured to profit by these 
favourable circumstances, to make his peace with 
the church. He was earnestly supported at 
Rome by the ambassadors of the king of Eng- 
land ; and had friends in the college of cardinals, 
who advised him to pursue his advantages in arms, 
whilst he negociated with the pope.f Whilst, 
therefore, he took possession of Agde and of sev- 
eral castles, he charged his ambassador at Rome 
to dispense money liberally in the sacred consis- 
tory, in order to gain new partisans ; and at the 
feast of Pentecost, he went toMontpeUierto hold 
a conference with that same Arnold, archbishop 
of Narbonne, who had done so much evil to his 
father, as legate of the first crusade against the 
Albigenses. J 

The count of Toulouse felt how important it 
was to conclude his pacification, whilst they were 
still willing to negociate with him. He showed 
himself therefore eager to give way upon every 
article. As he had always been sincerely at- 
tached to the faith of the church, it cost him noth- 
ing to promise conformity to it in future ; but he 
engaged, besides, to show no mercy to the here- 
tics ; to grant to count Montfort such conditions 
as might save his honor ; to augment the immu- 
nities of the churches ; to surrender to them 
those parts of his domain with which they had 

*Idera. § civ. r>, 234. 

t^^PiStola episcop. Lichfieldens. Rymer acta publica torn, i, 
p. 271. 
:i:Hist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv, xxiii, ch, lxxxix,xc,p. 340. 



A.D. 1224.] THE ALBIGENSES. 183 

been gratified by his enemies : and even before 
he had obtained any guarantee, he executed a 
part of these restitutions. Arnold, embarrassed 
by this unhesitating compliance with all his de- 
mands, knew not how to contrive to retard a pac- 
ification which seemed to be concluded. He ad- 
journed, however, the conferences, to the 21st of 
the following August, declaring that he must wait 
for new orders from Rome, to sign the definitive 
treaty. * 

Rome, on the reception of his letters, was no 
longer in the same disposition. Frederick II had 
retarded his departure in such Pt manner as to oc- 
casion doubt to Honorius III, respecting the 
success of the crusade to the East. War had 
broken out between the kings of France and 
England, and that war presented a still greater 
obstacle to the impulse which the pope had 
hoped to give to all Europe. Whilst he was in 
doubt respecting the turn which all these events 
might take, the holy father thought it imprudent 
to accept the submission of a prince, whom he 
might perhaps soon have a favourable opportuni- 
ty to crush. By his persuasion, or that of the 
king of France, Amaury de Montfort, sent no one 
to Montpellier with powers to accept the in- 
demnities offered by the count of Toulouse. 
Raymond, nevertheless, insisted, that the ab- 
sence of this envoy could not hinder the confer- 
ence, agreed upon between him and the archbish- 
op of Narbonne, from taking place. On the 

* Gallio Christiana, nova editio, t. vi, p. 336. Hist, gen. de 
LanguedoCj liv. xxiii, ch. xc. xci. p. 341. 



184 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1224. 

25th of August he renewed, to that prelate, the 
promises which he had already made to the 
church ; he signed them, and engaged by oath 
to observe them. After which, Arnold, to gain 
time, communicated to him an express order of 
the pope, to send those declarations to RomQ 
by a solemn embassage, and, at the same time, 
informed him, that flonorius III had mpinfested 
the most violent wrath at learning that Raymond 
VII had retaken, from the bishop of Viviers, the 
city of Argentiores, which bad belonged to the 
house of Saint Gilles, but had been taken from his 
father by the crusaders. * 

1224. The ambassadors of Raymond arrived 
at Rome in the month of October. They were 
admitted to several conferences, and the ambas- 
sadors of England seconded them with all their 
power. But the court of Rome was superlative- 
ly skilled in the art of spinning out negociations. 
At the end of the year, they had discussed much 
and concluded nothing. In the course of the fol- 
lowing year, they thought themselves equally 
occupied with their master's interests, because 
that every day new explanations were demanded, 
and every day they removed new difficulties. 
It was not till 1226 that they found out how 
they had been tricked, when they w^ere dismis- 
sed without any thing being granted them.f 

J 224. The truce between France and Eng- 
land, which Louis VIII had wished to prolong 

*Honorii III Epistolse Decano Valentinensi, Preuves Langue- 
dociennes, No. clxxxvii, p. 284. 

t Histoire gen. de Languedoc, liv.. xxiii, p.^ 343» liv.. xxivj p. 
845. 



A.D. 12*^4.] THE ALBIGENSES. 185 

Ibr ten years, expired at Easter, 1224 ; but Hen- 
ry III desired its renewal much more sincerely 
than the king of France. He had given orders 
to make compensation for all the damage which 
had been caused by his subjects to French mer- 
chants, and, at the same time, had ordered an 
inquest to ascertain also the damage wdiich his 
subjects had experienced ; for, in those ages of 
violence, there were but few treaties scrupulous- 
ly respected.* He had also sent ambassadors to 
the king of France, to demand that the truce, 
concluded by Philip Augustus, should be pro- 
longed for four years, on the same conditions.! 
Honorius III, on his side, had solicited Louis 
VIII to conclude a peace with the king of Eng- 
land ; or, at least, to bind himself by a long 
truce. He represented the advantage this would 
prove to the Holy Land, by removing an obsta- 
cle to the expedition of Frederic II. J But, 
whether Louis, from the displeasure which arose 
from the ill success of his negociations respecting 
Albigeois, wished to humble the pope ; or, 
whether he desired to employ the preparations 
he had made for the war w^ith Raymond, against 
another enemy, he announced to Henry III the 
renewal of hostilities, who, on his side, gave 
notice of it on the 15th of May, to all the barons 
of his kingdom, and invited them to be ready for 
war. II 

* Rymer Acta Publica, t. i, p. 265, 266. 
t Ibid, p. 270. 

:}:Honorii, lib. viii, Epist. No. 380,apudRaynaldi Ann.Eccles. 
1224, § siii, p. 338. 
IIRymer Acta Publica, t. i, p. 272. 



186 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.O. 1224. 

Honorius III, who protected the king of Eng- 
land, who had quite recently declared him ofage, 
and in consequence, had ordered all his counts 
and barons to restore the towns and fortresses 
which they held as a guarantee for their safety, 
would also have gladly restored him to the full 
exercise of absolute power, and abolished the 
great charter. But when he perceived that the 
nation adhered strenuously to its rights, and was 
prepared, to defend them, * he wrote to Henry 
III to engage him to observe his oaths, until he 
should find a more favourable occasion to violate 
them : ^ We suggest in particular to his highness, 
said he, and counsel h\m, in good faith, not to 
bring foward the rights of the crown, just at this 
time, and not to scandahze his subjects respecting 
the restitution of his revenues, but prudently to 
defer to a better opportunity this pretension, and 
others which might engender scandal.' f Henry 
III, ^however, did not follow the counsel which the 
pope boasted of having giving with such good faith. 
He entered into disputes with the earl of Chester 
and the greater part of his barons ; he attacked 
Foulques de Brent, and his brother, in their cas- 
tles ; he hanged the defenders of several fortres- 
ses, and appeared to have some success in his 
English expeditions ; but his whole army was oc- 
cupied in retaining his subjects in their obedience, 
and he had no soldiers to send into France, j 



* Matt. Paris Hist. Angl. ann. 1223, p. 268. 
tHonorii III Epist. lib. viii, ep. 355, apud Raynaldi, 1224, § 
xliv.p. 345. 
t Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 270. Radulphi Coggeshale, p. 118. 



A.D. 1225.] THE ALBIGENSKS. 187 

When Savary de Mauleon, who was charged to 
defend Poitou, was informed of the approach of 
Louis VIII with a numerous army, he in vain 
demanded reinforcements and subsidies, for the 
treasury was empty. The counsellors of Henry 
III, judged, however, that they could not dis- 
pense with embarking, at the tower of London, 
boxes apparently filled with money, to inspire 
the soldiers with the confidence that they would 
very soon be paid ; but when these chests were 
opened upon their arrival at Rochelle, they were 
found to be filled with stones and bran.* 

The campaign of Louis VIII, against the for- 
mer possessions of the kings of England in 
France, was speedily terminated, and left him 
time to meet, in the beginning of November, 
at Vancoulours, Henry king of the Romans, eld- 
est son of Frederic II. These two princes sign- 
ed a treaty of alliance, and reciprocally engaged 
to conclude no arrangement with the king of En- 
gland without the consent of both.f 

1225. In the beginning of the year 1225, 
the cardinal Romano di Sant. Angelo, was sent 
by the pope to Louis VIII to renew the negocia- 
tions respecting the Albigenses. The zeal of 
Frederic II for the conquest of the Holy Land 
w^as cooled, or, at least, the difficulties of the un- 
dertaking, the revolts which were continually 
breaking out in Germany and Italy, the need 
which every part of his states had of reform, and 
of the inspection of the monarch, made him de- 

* Gesta Ludovici, viii, p. 305. Chron. Turon. p. 305.. 
t Martene coUectio amplissima, torn, i, p. 1195. Gesta 
Ludovici, p. 307. Chron. Turon. p. 306. 



188 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1225. 

sire to defer his voyage to a more convenient 
time. The king of Jerusalem had undertaken to 
obtain from Honorius III that the crusade should 
be postponed for two years. The state of the 
Holy Land, where the Christians possessed but 
two cities, could not suffer from this delay. 
Honorius consented ; he adjourned till August, 
1227, the departure of Frederic 11; but at the 
same time imposed upon him the condition of 
conducting at that period a determinate number 
of troops to the Holy Land, and of passing at 
least two years in Syria.* 

These two years might suffice to annihilate 
completely the house of Saint Gilles, to which 
the church thought it imprudent to pardon the 
injuries she had done it. Raymond VII refused 
no sacrifice ; disputed respecting no condition ; 
he only demanded, for the repose of his con- 
science, and for that of his subjects, to be receiv- 
ed again into the bosom of the church. He 
abandoned the heretics to all the rigors which she 
desired to exercise towards them ; and the learn- 
ed, the equitable Benedictine author of the his- 
tory of Languedoc, not being able entirely to free 
himself from the sentiments of his order, repels, 
as an atrocious calumny, the charge that he de- 
manded liberty of conscience for the Albigenses.f 

* Raynaldl Annal. Eccles. 1225, ch. i, et seq. p. 346. 

■)• Langlois, Hist, des Albigeois, liv. viii, p. 418, Iip.u made thfg 
supposition, to justify tlie rigours of the church : the Rev. father 
Vaissette, victoriously refutes it, by the acts of the council, liv. 
xxiv, ch. i. p. 346. But what v.as then the doctrine of the 
French clergy in 1737, since at that epoch, one of its most re- 
spectable, most virtuous, most enlightened members, regarded as 
an atrocious calumny, the accusation of tolerance 1 



A..D. 1225.] THE ALBIGENSES. 189 

But no reconciliation was possible, between this 
prince and those who could only be satisfied with 
his absolute ruin. Raymond at last thought he 
had removed all the difficulties which had b^ien 
opposed to him, when the cardinal Rorr/ano de 
Sant. Angelo published against him a bull, to 
which it was impossible to reply, as it was im- 
possible to understand it. It contained only the 
miserable conceits and witticisms of the Vatican. 
' The miserable state, or rather the established 
misery of the Narbonnensian province, and of 
the neighbouring regions,' said the pope, ' has long 
tormented us with anxiety, and suspended us in 
doubt. In our anxiety, we sought whether we 
could not find a way and manner to raise the in- 
terests of the faith and of peace, which appeared 
absolutely cast down in these countries ; in our 
doubt we hesitated whether this land was not so 
corrupted, that all labor which we could bestow 
upon it would be useless. ... In truth, this land 
though labored with much sweat— though sweat- 
ed with much labor — has been in vain forged by 
its smith, for all its malice has not been consum- 
ed, all its rust has not been removed, even by the 
fire to which God, by a hidden, yet a just judg- 
ment, has delivered the infidehty of the hearts of 
its inhabitants, and the frost of their malice. 
Neither the fomentations of caresses nor the tor- 
ments of flagellations have been able to soften 
them. They have so hardened their hearts 
against God,that,although given up to a multitude 
of scourges, they have not accepted their disci- 
pline. Because they have had some success 
against the church, they see in it the confirmation 



190 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1225. 

of their eri*ors, not considering that the felicity of 
sinners is the greatest of all infelicities.'* 

The statesman would have blushed, who should 
bave attempted to kindle a temporal war, without 
giving better reasons for it than such antitheses; 
as these ; but they were quite sufficient to justify 
a religious war. However, the cardinal of Sant. 
Angelo, who was employed to persuade Louis 
Viri to a crusade against the Albigenses, was al- 
so commissioned, not to break off the negociation 
with Raymond VII, until he was sure of success. 
-In consequence, he invited him to repair to a na- 
tional council, of all the church of France, to be 
held at Bourges on the 29th of November, 1225, 
thus reserving to himself all the summer, to treat 
beforehand with his enemies. f 

Although the Albigenses of Languedoc could 
no longer really give any inquietude to the church 
of Rome, yet the intolerance of the pope was 
awakened by other sym.ptoms of mental agitation 
which he saw around him. The persecutions of 
the sectaries, had, by dispersing them, spread the 
germs of reformation, through all the countries of 
the Romanesque language. The unhappy suffer- 
ers, who had been treated with such pitiless cru- 
elty, and who, on account of what they had 
endured, {pati) were designated by the name of 
Paterins, distinguished themselves by the purity 
of their conduct, as well as by that of their doc- 
trine ; the contrast, between their morals and 
those of the priests, was apparent to all ; they did 

* Bull 15, Kal. Martii apud Raynaldum, 1225, § xxviii, xxixj^ 
p. 351. 

t Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. iii, p. 348. 



A.D. 1225.] THE ALBIGENSES. 191 

not profess to separate from the church, but only 
desired liberty to effect their salvation, as different 
orders of monks had done, by a greater austerity. 
They had multipUed in Italy, and especially in 
Lombardy, and, in this same year, Honorius III 
charged the bishops of Modena, of Brescia, and 
of Rimini, to inquire after them, to pull down 
their houses and destroy their race.* 

1225. The greatest obstacle to the renewal of 
the crusade against the Albigenses, was the war 
in which Louis VIII was engaged with the king 
of England. Henry III, profiting by the popu- 
larity which his youth had still left him, had as- 
sembled a parhament at Westminster; he had 
exposed to his subjects the injustice wdiich had 
been done him in his continental possessions, and 
had demanded their aid to recover the rich prov- 
inces of which the crown had been dispossessed. 
The English, occupied in their island with cir- 
cumscribing the abuses of the royal authority, did 
not attach any very great value to the possessions 
of their king in France, which were not submitted 
to their laws. They acquiesced, however, in the 
demands of Henry, and his chief justice, Hubert 
du Burgh. A fifteenth, upon moveable property, 
had been judged sufficient subsidy to form a fair 
army ; this was granted him, on condition that 
the king should c'onfirm anew the great charter, 
and the forest charter, which he had repeatedly 
sworn to observe, and which he had observed al- 
ways like a king. Henry III submitted to the 
condition ; he sent express orders into all the 

*Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1225, ch. xlvii, p. 355. 



192 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1225. 

^counties, to respect the privileges of the people ; 
and, in return, he raised the sums which had been 
granted him. On Palm-Sunday he despatched 
for Bourdeaux his brother Richard, whom he had 
recently knighted, and to whom he had granted 
the titles of earl of Cornwall and of Poitou, with 
only sixty knights.* William, earl of Sahsbury, 
and Philip d'Aubignac, were given him as coun- 
sellors ; in a httle time they assembled around 
him the principal barons of Gascogny : they com- 
pelled to submission those who before rejected 
his authority, or who had embraced the French 
party, and with this little army they undertook at 
last to besiege Reole.t 

On his side, Louis VIII had held many par- 
liaments at Paris, and had occupied the lords who 
had assembled there, sometimes about the affairs 
of the Albigenses, and sometimes w^ith the war 
against England. When he received the news 
of the landing of the English at Bourdeaux, he 
advanced as far as Tours, and afterwards to Chi- 
non ;X and the count of Marche engaged in a 
trifling combat with Richard, heutenant of his 
brother Henry II, in Aquitaine. But, on either 
side the forces were inconsiderable ; the two 
princes stood equally on the defensive, and both 
lent an ear to the solicitations of Honorius III, 
and his legate, the cardinal of Sant. Angelo, who 

* Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 272. Annales Waverlienses, t« 
xviii, 209. 

t Matt. Paris, p. 272. Chron. Turon. p. 308. 

i Honorii III Epist. apud Raynald. 1225, ch. xxx, xxxi, p. 
352. 



A.D. 1225.] THE ALBIGENSES. 193 

wished either to engage them to conclude a good 
peace, or, at least, to renew a long truce.* 

Raymond VII well knew that his ruin was 
the ultimate object of all the negociations between 
the king of France and the church. The 29th 
of September he had to regret the death of the 
archbishop of Narbonne. This was, neverthe- 
less, that same Arnold, abbot of Citeaux, who 
had directed the crusade with so much ferocity,, 
as legate of the holy see ; but his ambition and 
his disputes with the house of Montfort, made 
him then seek for support in that of Saint Gilles.f 
On the other hand, Henry III had himself solic- 
ited the friendship of the count of Toulouse^ 
although prudence had compelled him to require 
that their alliance should, for some time be kept 
secret..t. Raymond VII, encouraged by the pro- 
mises of that king, proceeded, at the end of No- 
vember, to the council of Bourges. 

1225. This council proved very numerous ; 
few partial assemblies of the church had present- 
ed a more imposing appearance. There were 
reckoned six archbishops, one hundred and thir- 
teen bishops, and one hundred and fifty abbots ; 
another historian makes the number of archbish- 
ops to be as high as fourteen. The legate pre- 
sided, the king of France assisted with his court, 
and Raymond VII of Saint Gilles, on the one 
part, Amaury de Montfort, on the other, present- 
ed themselves to set forth their claims npon the 



*Gesta Ludov. viii, p. 309^ Chron.Guill. de Nangis, p. 514. 
t Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. iv, p. 349. 
IRymerActa, t, i, p. 281. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. 
xxiv, ch. ii. p. 347. 

12 



194 CRUSADES AGAINST [ A.D, 1225. 

countship of Toulouse. Amaury displayed the 
titles of the donations made to his father by the 
pope and by king Philip, and maintained that 
Raymond had been irrevocably deprived of his 
heritage, by the highest authority in the church, 
that of the oecumenical council of Lateran. 
Raymond, on his part, declared himself ready to 
do service for his fiefs, and to acquit himself, 
both towards the king and the church of Rome, 
of all that he ov^ed to them on account of his 
heritage. ' Would you submit, in this matter,' 
replied Amaury, ' to the judgment of the tvs^elve 
peers of France ?' ' Let the king first receive my 
homage,' replied Raymond, ' and I am ready to 
submit to it ; otherwise, perhaps the peers would 
not acknowledge me as one of their body.' The 
legate was very far from being desirous that the 
cause of the church should be debated in this 
public and chivalrous manner. He hastened to 
close the discussion ; he enjoined on each of the 
archbishops, to assemble his bishops, and to de- 
liberate with them without communication with 
his brethren ; then he demanded of each to trans- 
mit to him his opinion in writing, and he fulmin- 
ated an excommunication, against whoever of the 
prelates should reveal the secret of these partial 
deliberations.* 

Nevertheless, a pretext was wanted for refus- 
ing absolution to a prince, who desired to be re- 
conciled to the church, and for directing upon 

*Matt. Paris, p. 277. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. 
iii, p. 348. Preuves, No. clx, p. 299. Chronicon Turon. MSS. 
in Labbei Consiliis, t. xi, p. 291. Chron. Turonense, t.xviii, p. 
310. 



A.D. 1225.] THE ALBIGENSES. 195 

him all the forces of Christendom. The legate, 
therefore, repeated against the count all the old 
accusations of heresy and revolt ; Raymond VIl, 
addressing the legate with the most earnest pray- 
ers, then ' besought him to come in person and 
visit each of the cities of his province, to make 
inquiries of each individual, as to the articles of 
his faith, and if he found any w^ho differed from 
the catholic behef, he protested that he v^as rea- 
dy to inflict upon him the severest punishments, 
according to the judgment of the holy church. 
In like manner, if any city w^as found rebelhous, 
he affirmed that he v\ras ready vv^ith all his power 
to compel it, as well as all its inhabitants, to make 
satisfaction. As to himself, he offered, if he had 
sinned in any thing, (which he did not remember 
to have done) to make full penitence to God and 
the holy church, like a faithful Christian ; and, 
if it pleased the legate, he was wilhng equally to 
suffer the examination of his faith. But the leg- 
ate despised all these things, and the count, cath- 
olic as he was, could obtain no favour, 'unless be 
would renounce his heritage, for himself and his 
heirs !'* 

Some disputes of precedence between the 
archbishops, some demands of the Romish church 
upon the chapters of the cathedrals, in each of 
which the pope wished to have two prebends at 
his disposal, made a diversion of the labours of 
the council, and gave opportunity to withdraw 
the affairs of the Albigenses from public discus- 
sion. The legate profited by this circumstance 

* Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 279. 



196 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1225. 

to conclude the treaty between Louis VIII and 
the court of Rome, He acceded to all the de- 
mands which Louis had formerly made : he grant- 
ed to those who should ^ke the cross against the 
AlbigenseSj the most extensive indulgences ; and 
prohibited the king of England, under pain of 
excommunication, from disquieting the king of 
France, as long as he should be engaged in the 
service of God and the church, even respecting 
the territories which he might unjustly possess.* 
All these measures being taken, the legate dis- 
missed the council, the king returned to Paris, 
count Raymond into his territories, and the car- 
dinal then declared, that the separate opinion 
which he had received from each archbishop, 
was, ^ that Raymond ought, in no case, to be ab- 
solved on account of the offers he had made ; 
■ but that the king of the French should be charg- 
ed by the church with this affair, since no other 
could, so well as he, purge the land from the 
wickedness of the heretics j that, in fine, to re- 
compense the king for his expenses, the tenth of 
all the ecclesiastical revenues should be assigned 
to him for five years, if the war lasted so long.f 
1225. In accepting this commission from the 
church, Louis remembered that he might not 
survive the war he was about to undertake. He, 
therefore, made his will, in the month of June, 
1225; and whilst the kings his predecessors had 
been contented to distribute, by such acts, their 
moveable riches for pious purposes, he, for the 

*Matt. Paris, p. 279., 

t Instrumentum Romahi Cardinalis, Preuves de Languedoc, No* 
«lxxxi, p. 323. 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 197 

first time, endeavored to dispose of the crown 
and its fiefs. He called his eldest son to the 
succession of the throne of France, he destined 
Artois to the second, Anjou and Maine to the 
third, PoitOLi and Auvergne to the fourth, and he 
ordered, besides, that the countship of Boulogne, 
with which his brother was invested, should re- 
turn to the crown, if this brother died without 
children.* 

The king of the French was very willing to 
accept the confiscations of the territories belong- 
ing to the count of Toulouse, as the avenger of 
die offended church ; but he wished, at the same 
time, to shield himself against the accusation of 
cupidity or injustice, by the authority of those 
who had given him this counsel. In that age 
kings were not accustomed to take upon them-, 
selves alone the responsibility of government. 
They felt that they were only the chiefs of a 
confederation of princes. No constitution had, 
it is true, regulated how these princes should take 
part in the common deliberations, or had guaran- 
teed their right of suffrage in the national assem- 
blies ; the king, however, knew that it would be 
nearly impossible to cause the great vassals to 
execute what they had not previously determined 
in their diet. He therefore assembled parha- 
ments ; and by this name was then understood 
conferences of the freest nature with those whom 
he wished to consult, and whom he called to his 
councils. On the 28th of January, 1226, Louis 
VIII convoked at Paris one of those parliaments 

* Testamentuin Ludovici VIII ad calcem gestorum, p. 310. 



198 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

or assemblies of notables. It is probable that 
the lords temporal and spiritual voted in common ; 
nevertheless their acts are come down to us sep- 
arate. On the one hand, twenty-seven secular 
lords, on the other, seventeen archbishops or bish- 
ops, declared by letters patent, given in that as- 
sembly, that they counselled the king to take 
upon himself the affair of the Albigenses, and 
promised to assist him with all their power ; the 
one as his liege-men, the other by excommunicat- 
ing all his enemies. Amongst the first were sev- 
en counts, those of Boulogne, of Britanny, of 
Dreux, of Chartres, of Saint Paul, of Rouci, 
and of Vendome, none of whom ranked amongst 
the twelve peers of the realm ; there were also 
many great officers of the crown, and the chiefs 
of the illustrious houses of Montmorency, of 
Courtenay, of Nesle, and of Coucy ; these twen- 
ty-five lords, however, can by no means be con- 
sidered as representing the nobility of the king- 
dom.* 

Two days after, the 30th of January, the king 
took the cross with all his barons ; and the legate 
publicly excommunicated as a condemned heretic 
Raymond count of Toulouse, with all his asso- 
ciates. Amaury de Montfort, with the approba- 
tion of his uncle Guy, ceded to the king all his 
pretensions upon the domains of Albigeois, in 
exchange for the post of constable of France ; 
the legate granted to Louis one hundred thousand 
livres annually, to be taken from the tenth of the 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. v. p. 350, Preuves, 
no. 161, 162, p. 299, 300 j Chron. Turon. Anonym, torn, xviii, 
p. 311. 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 199 

ecclesiastical possessions of the kingdom, and he 
sent out missionaries to every part of France, with 
power to absolve, from all their sins, those who 
should repair to Bourges, a month after easter, to 
serve in the army which Louis would at that time 
take under his command.* 

On the 29th of March, the king assembled a 
new parliament at Paris, to concert measures for 
the expedition which had been resolved upon. 
Some years had already elapsed since the cru- 
sades had ceased, so that those who had, in the 
interval, arrived at the age of manhood, and 
those who, having already served in the sacred 
wars, remembered only their pleasures, equally 
desired a fresh opportunity of bathing in the 
blood of the infidels. The great lords saw, with 
more of suspicion, the oppression of one of the 
first peers of the kingdom, and the union of his 
vast domains to the crown. They readily per- 
ceived that if their king, after having expelled 
the king of England from his domains, should 
also conquer those belonging to the count of Tou- 
louse, the power of an individual would, in France, 
replace their feudal republic ; but the expedition 
against the Albigenses, had been decreed by the 
authority of the realm united with that of the 
church, so that they were obliged to perform the 
service of their fiefs under the double penalty of 
forfeiture and excommunication. Henry III, who 
w^ould willingly have made a diversion on the 
side of Guienne, received so many summonses 

* Matt, Par. Hist. Ang. p. 279. Gesta Ludov. viii, p. 309. 
Chron. Turon. torn, xviii, p. 312. 



200 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

from the pope to engage him to remain neuter,* 
that he consented to send deputies on the 22nd 
of March to the cardinal legate, to renew the 
truce.f James, king of Aragon, yielding in like 
manner to the pope's solicitations, prohibited his 
people from assisting the Albigenses, although he 
was himself nephew to the count of Toulouse. 
The count of Roussillon took the same part, and 
was afterwards imitated by Raymond Berenger 
count of Provence and of Forcalquier, Hugues 
X de Lusignan, count of la Marche, who had 
caused his son to marry a daughter of Raymond 
VII, sent her back to him, declaring that after 
the summons of the king and the church, he broke 
off all connexion with him. J And whilst the 
unhappy Raymond saw himself deserted by all 
his allies, with the only exception of the count of 
Foix, he learned that the army destined to anni- 
hilate him, reckoned, in knights, squires, and 
serjeants-at-arms, fifty thousand horsemen.^ 

None can describe the terror which such a for- 
midable armament inspired in the country destin- 
ed to experience its fury, and which had already 
felt all the horrors of religious wars. The peo- 
ple knew that the reformed preaching had entire- 
ly ceased in their province ; they would probably 
themselves have sacrificed the heretics, had they 
known where to find them, from resentment for 
the ills which the sectaries had already brought 



* Matt. Paris, p. 279. Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 1226, § xxxir, 
et seq. p. 364. 

t Rymer Acta Publica, torn, i, p. 285. 

:}: Chron. Turon. Anonym, p. 314. 

§ Matt. Paris, p. 280. Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. 
xii, p. 354. 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 201 

upon them, and those with which they were still 
menaced. Those same inhabitants of the count- 
ship of Toulouse who saw themselves so cruelly 
persecuted by the Roman church, knew in their 
consciences, that they were nevertheless zealous 
Roman catholics ; and therefore they were fully 
persuaded that the crusaders, as they were in- 
formed, had engaged to pass through the territo- 
ry of the count of Toulouse from one extremity 
to the other, in order to put all the inhabitants to 
the sword, and people it with another race.* 

Excessive fear dissolved all the ancient bands 
of affection, of relationship, and of feudal sub- 
jection. Whilst Louis was collecting his army 
at Bourges, and was traversing the Nivernois, and 
when he arrived at Lyons on the 28th of May, 
for the feast of the ascension, he received depu- 
tations after deputations from all the barons of 
the states of Raymond or from the cities which 
w^ere subject to him, to offer their oath of fidelity, 
their keys, their hostages, all the guarantees, in 
a word, of their entire obedience to the king and 
the church, which the crusaders could desire. 
The inhabitants of Avignon were amongst the 
number of those who had long ago offered them- 
selves to Louis. They placed at his service, the 
use of their city and of their bridge over the 
Rhone. It was, in fact, their embassy which de- 
termined Louis to choose that route for entering 
the states of Raymond. f 

*Et sicterram comitis totam ab initio usque ad finem cumhab- 
itatoribus ejus deleri — Matt. Paris. Hist. Ang. p. 280. 

fHist. Gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. ix,p.352. The dep. 
uties faom Avignon who had met the king at Clermont d'AuvergaCj 



202 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

Avignon, as well as Aries, Marseilles, and 
Nice, and the country situated on the left bank 
of the Rhone, belonged to the kingdom of Aries, 
or to the empire, and not to the kingdom of 
France. But the authority of the emperor over 
that country was then reduced to an empty name. 
The grand vassals of Provence were the real sove- 
reigns, and the four cities we have named, hav- 
ing continually been increasing the provinces of 
their communes, had at last become true repub- 
lics ; governed upon the model of the cities of 
Lombardy, by a podestat, with annual consuls 
and a council of the commune. Avignon had, 
nevertheless, retained a great affection for the 
house of Saint Gilles ; and this city which had 
been amongst the first to open its gates to Ray- 
mond VII on his return from the council of Lat- 
eran, had submitted from love to him, to remain 
twelve years under an excommunication. The 
inhabitants of Avignon did not feel themselves 
strong enough to sustain the first violence of the 
crusade, nor did they think that count Raymond 
himself would be able to resist it. They there- 
fore offered to the king provisions and the pas- 
sage of the Rhone, but they would not receive 
an army so ill supphed, and ill disciplined, as his, 
within their walls. In conformity with this line 
of conduct, the podestat and consul of the city, 
representing the community,! took all proper 

had agreed with him tiiat he should only enter into the city with 
a hundred knights, and the legate with only the archbishop and 
the bishops ; but that the inhabitants should furnish to all the rest 
of the array provisions at an equitable price. Chronicon Turon- 
ense, p. 314, torn, xviii des historiens de France. 

t Boucher Hist, de Provence, liv. ix, sect. 2, t. ii, p. 211 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 203 

measures for the safety of their repubhc. They 
repaired their walls, provided themselves with 
arms and machines of war, and brought into their 
city all the provisions of the neighbouring fields. 
Raymond VII, on whom those lands depended, 
took no offence at the advances which they had 
made to his enemy. He did not despair of his 
safety, but he knew that he could not meet the 
formidable army which was coming against him, 
in the open field. He had therefore confined his 
endeavours to the prolongation of the war, in the 
hope that time might procure him some favoura- 
ble changes. On the one hand, to confirm the 
affections of his subjects, he granted new privi- 
leges to the inhabitants of Toulouse, and new 
fiefs to Roger Bernard, count of Foix, his only 
ally.* On the other, he concerted with the city 
of Avignon, after they had supplied themselves, 
to destroy all the grain and forage^ which they 
had not secured, and even took care to break up 
all the meadows, that the crusaders might find no 
green forage. f 

The bridge which crosses the Rhone from 
Avignon to the suburbs now called VilU-Neuve, 
and formerly Saint-Andre, rests upon a small 
island, which divides the course of the river. It 
is of stones, and the city on one side, and the 
suburb on the other, enclose it like two tetes de 
pout. But the magistrates had constructed a 
wooden frame, which began from this island, and 
terminated above the city. By this bridge of wood, 
Louis VIII, immediately on his arrival, passed 

*Hist. g6n. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xi, p. 354. 
t Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 280. 



204 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

three thousand soldiers ; there was no necessity for 
him to demand any other passage ; and, as the city 
did not acknowledge him as its lord, either imme- 
diate or sovereign, he ought to have contented 
himself with the offer that was made him, to open 
a passage for his army without the walls, and ho- 
nourably to admit, into the city, himself and the 
legate, with the most distinguished persons of the 
court. But, the legate and the priests wished to 
punish a city, which had remained twelve years 
in impenitence, under the weight of an excommu- 
nication : the crusaders were envious of the rich- 
es which they expected to find accumulated in it, 
and the pride of the king was wounded with any 
opposition made to his authority. He declared 
to the podestats and consuls of Avignon, that he 
wished to pass the Rhone by the stone bridge, 
and for that purpose to traverse their city with his 
lance on his thigh, at the head of his whole army. 
The consuls, worthy of the energy of a rising re- 
public, boldly declared that they would not per- 
mit it, and immediately shut their gates against 
him. * 

Louis VIII had arrived before Avignon, on 
the 6th of June, 1226, the eve of Pentecost ; 
but it was not till the 10th that he commenced 
the siege. The negociations of the preceding 
days had been brought so near to a conclusion, 
that the citizens had restored fifty hostages, who 
were in their custody. Nevertheless, on the 9th 

*Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 280. Boucher Hist, de Provence' 
liv. ix, sect, ii, p. 221. Guil. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxv, p, 
687. Pra^clara Francor. facinora, p. 774. (He copies Puy 
Laurens.) 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 205 

the legate published a decree, enjoining upon the 
king to purge the city from heretics ; and the 
French having, during the truce, made an at- 
tempt to surprise one of the gates, blood was spil- 
led on both sides, and the conferences were bro- 
ken off. * 

However, the siege of Avignon was found to 
be a much more difficult enterprise, than the legate 
and the crusaders had expected. The city was 
strong, both from its situation, and from a double 
inclosure of walls ; the population was numerous, 
and well provided with arms and warlike ma- 
chines ; they knew all the dangers to which their 
resistance exposed them ; and the fate which 
awaited them if they should happen to fall. But 
they relied upon the goodness of their cause, and 
the protection of the emperor Frederic II, to 
whom Louis hastened to write to justify his ag- 
gression ;f and the love of liberty redoubled the 
bravery of its defenders. ' They returned,' says 
Matthew Paris, ' stones for stones, arrows for ar- 
rows, beams for beams, spears for spears, they in- 
vented machines to destroy the effect of those of 
the besiegers, and they inflicted m.ortal w^ounds 
upon the French.'."!: 

Although the siege of Avignon lasted three 
months, we have no other account, than that con- 
tained in these few words, of the various battles 
which were fought around the walls of that city. 
We only know that they were very destructive to 



* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xiv. p. 356. ChronJ 
Turon. p. 315. 

t Preuves a i'Hist. de Languedoc, No. 171. p. 310. 
t Matt. PariSi p. 280v Chronicon Turonense, p. 315. 



206 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1226. 

the army of the crusaders, and that the two po- 
destats of Avignon, Wilham Raymond, and Ray- 
mond^de Rial, who took, at the same time, the 
title of bailiffs or representatives of the count of 
Toulouse, shewed themselves worthy of the con- 
fidence of the people and the prince.* The fall 
of tne wooden bridge, at the time that the crusa- 
ders were crowded upon it, precipitated a great 
number into the river ; many more were slain in 
the assaults, or by the sorties of the besiegers ; 
but the greatest loss which the army of Louis ex- 
perienced, was caused by disease and famine. 
Provisions, and especially forage, failed, in that 
burning climate, in the midst of summer, to the 
most numerous body of cavalry that had ever 
been assembled in France. Louis was obliged to 
send foraging parties to a great distance, but they 
almost all fell into the hands of Raymond VII, 
who, avoiding a battle, still hovered on the flanks 
of the besiegers. The camp was soon surround- 
ed, in every direction, with the carcasses of horses 
which had died either from privation or fatigue. 
Their stench produced maladies amongst the sol- 
diers, and it is asserted that the large flies which 
were nourished by their putrified flesh, and which 
afterwards attacked the men, propagated the con- 
tagion by their stings. Guy, count of Saint Paul, 
the bishop of Limoges, and two hundred knights- 
bannerets sunk under the destructive fever which 
attacked the army ; and Matthew Paris makes the 
number of the crusaders, of all ranks, who per- 

* Preuves a I'Hist. de Languedoc, No. clxix, p. 308. 



A.D 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 207 

ished in this siege, amount to twenty thousand 
men.* 

But the army of the crusaders had not all re- 
mained under the walls of Avignon ; detached 
parties, profiting by the terror which they inspir- 
ed, received the submission of the neighbouring 
lords, cities, and castles. The city Nismes plant- 
ed on its walls, on the 5th of June, 1226, the 
king's standard, and from that epoch it has re- 
mained in the immediate domain of the crown ; 
those of Puilaurens and of Castres follow^ed the 
example in the days following. Carcassonne 
and Albi sent their deputies, after the 16th of 
June, to the camp before Avignon to deliver the 
keys of their fortress. The number of the lords 
who capitulated was greater. Raymond VII, 
though still beloved by his subjects, was abandon- 
ed at the same time by the barons and the com- 
munes. f 

It is true that Louis VIII began also at this 
time to see some of his vassals withdraw from his 
army. Thibaud IV, or the Posthumous, count 
of Champaign, set them the example. This 
prince, at that tim.e twenty-six years of age, who 
was reckoned amongst the best poets of the new 
French language, who called himself the knight 
of the queen Blanche, and who pretended to be 
in love with her, though she was more than forty 
years of age, was, nevertheless, not so blinded by 
gallantry, as to be indifferent to the subjugation 

* Matt. Paris Hist. Ang. p. 281. Hist, gen de Languedoc, liv: 
xxiv, ch. xvii, p. 358. 

fHist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xiii,p. 355 — 358. 
Preuves, No. 174, p. 314. Histoire de Nismes, liv. iii, p. 294. 



208 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

of the great feudatories. It is believed that he 
concerted with Peter Mauclerc, count or duke of 
Britanny, and with Hugues de Lusignan count of 
Marche and Angouleme, to save the count of 
Toulouse from utter ruin.* When he had fin- 
ished the forty days to which he was bound by 
his feudal service, he demanded of Louis VIII 
leave to retire. Louis refused him on the ground 
that he was in the service of the church, whose 
laws superseded those of the realm. Thibaud 
was incensed ; the king threatened to ravage his 
domains ; to this threat the count of Champaign 
paid no regard and quitted him. The alter- 
cation between them was, however, so violent, 
that when Louis died a short time after, there was 
a report current, that this great lord, the lover of 
his wife, had caused him to be poisoned.f 

During these proceedings, the citizens of Avig- 
non, after having caused infinite loss to the army 
of the crusaders, consented, at last, on the 12th 
of September, to capitulate. Matthew Paris re- 
lates that they only engaged to receive, within 
their walls, the legate and the high lords of the 
army, but that these being introduced into the 
city wath their attendants, took possession of the 
gates in contempt of the capitulation. J Neither 



*Histoire de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xvii, p. 358. Lobineau 
Histoire de Bretagne, liv. viii, ch. xlv. p. 218. 

t Matt: Paris, p. 281. Gesta Ludov. regis, p. 308. Chroniq. 
de Saint-Denys, p. 421. 

Father Lobineau says it is sufficiently certain that Louis VIII 
died by poison, but it remains uncertain by whom that poison was 
given. Hist, de Bretagne, liv. vii, ch. xlviii, p. 219. 

:j: Matt. Paris, p. 281. According to the Chronique de Tours, 
U xviii, p. 317, the citizens referred themselves to the arbitration 
of the legate) not expecting so severe a sentence. 



A.D. 1226.] THE AI^IGENSES. 209 

the king nor the legate thought themselves, in 
conscience, obliged to keep any faith with excom- 
municated heretics, but they owed some regard 
to Frederic II, and it was probably on his account 
that they contented themselves with requiring 
three hundred hostages, as a guarantee for the 
submission of the citizens to the commands of 
the church and the legate ; with imposing on the 
city a warlike contribution ; with throwing down 
parts of its walls and towers ; and with putting 
to the sword the Flemings and the French who 
were found in the garrison. It is probable that, 
but for the recommendation of the emperor, 
all the inhabitants would have been put to 
death. * 

Louis remained a short time at Avignon with 
his army. Fifteen days after he had taken the 
city, a terrible inundation of the Durance covered 
all the space which had been occupied by the 
French camp. If the soldiers had not taken their 
quarters within the walls, they would all have 
been swept away by the water, with their tents 
and baggage. At this epoch Louis confided the 
government of Beaucaire and of Nismes to a 
French knight, who, from that time took the 
title of seneschal of the two cities. The kins; 
afterwards passed through the province, and 
arrived within four leagues of Toulouse, magnifi- 
cently entertained and feasted by the bishop Fou- 
quet, who followed the army ; respectfully ad- 

* Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxv, p. 687. Prseclara Francor. 
facin. p. 774. Bern. Guid. Vit. Honor. Ill, p. 570. Bouche 
Hist, de Provence, liv. ix, § ii, p. 221. -^Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. 
1226 et 40, p. 365. 

13 



210 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

mitted into their castles by the Languedocian 
lords, from whom he successively received an 
oath of fidelity, giving a seneschal to Carcassonne, 
as he had done to Beaucaire ; rasing the city of 
Limoux, the capital of Razez, which was situa- 
ted upon a hill, to rebuild it on a plain ; and, in 
fine, receiving in the month of October, in the 
city of Pamiers, the submission of all the bishops 
of the province.* 

But throughout this whole expedition Louis 
VIII had not the opportunity of signalizing the 
bravery of his soldiers, by a single warhke exploit. 
The counts of Toulouse and of Foix, who had 
renewed their aUiance, under the guarantee of the 
city of Toulouse, avoided every battle, and every 
kind of action. They determined to suffer the 
crusaders to exhaust themselves by their own ef- 
forts, supposing that if Louis returned into their 
province in the following year, as he had threat- 
ened, he would at least not be followed by so 
large a body of fanatics ; that they would have 
received a lesson from the mortality and suffer- 
ings before Avignon ; and that their persecuting 
zeal would be much abated, by having observed 
none of these heretics in the province, of whom 
so much had been told them. By the same rea- 
soning, but with a quite contrary interest, the 
king, the legate, and the bishop Fouquet, ear- 
nestly desired to find, in the country where they 
had made war, some of those enemies of the 
church, for whose extirpation the whole of France 

* Guil. de Podio Laur. cap. xxxvi, p. 688. Prseclara Francor, 
facinor. p. 775. 



A.D. 1226.] THE ALBIGENSES. 211 

had been put in motion. Nothing was more 
difficuh than this, after fifteen years of persecu- 
tion, during which they had either been expelled 
or put to death. It was with the greatest exer- 
tions that they at last discovered, at Cannes, in 
the diocese of Narbonne, an ancient preacher of 
the Albigenses, named Peter Isarn, who being 
too old to quit the country, had concealed him- 
self in the most secret retreats. He was con- 
demned by the archbishop of Narbonne, and 
burned with great ceremony. After this execu- 
tion, Louis prepared for his return : he entrusted 
his conquests to the government of Humbert de 
Beaujeu, a knight distinguished both for his 
birth and valour, and took the road towards Au- 
vergne in his way to Northern^France.* 

But the germs of that malady, which had caus- 
ed so many ravages during the siege of Avignon, 
still remained in the army, and the fatigue, the 
heat, and the march across an unhealthy country 
during the feverish season, gave them additional 
activity. Wilham archbishop of Rheims, the 
count of Namur, and Bouchard de Marli, fell the 
first victims to this epidemic. Louis VIII, on 
his arrival at Montpensier, in Auvergne, on the 
29th of October, felt himself attacked in his turn. 
He was obliged to rest there, and soon discovered 
that his malady was mortal. On the third of 
November he called into his chamber the pre- 
lates and the principal lords by whom he had 
been accompanied, viz. the Archbishop of Bour- 
ges and of Sens ; the bishops of Beauvais, of 

* Hist, de LanguedoCj liv. xxiv, ch. xxiii — xxvi, p, 359—362. 



212 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

Noyon, and of Chartres, Philip his brother, 
count of Boulogne, the count of Blois, Enguer- 
rand de Coucy, Archambaud de Bourbon, Jean 
de Nesle, and Etienne de Sancerre. He com- 
mended to them his eldest son, then only twelve 
years of age, and afterwards celebrated as Saint 
Louis ; he confided him to the care of his wife, 
Blanche of Castille ; he demanded of his prelates 
and barons that they would promise to crown 
him, without delay, as their lord and king, and 
pay him their homage ; and he made them confirm 
this promise by a solemn oath. The malady 
soon reached its last stage, and he expired on the 
8th of November, 1226.* 



*Martene Thesaurus anecdotor. torn, ij p. 9S7. Guil. de Podio 
Laurentii, cap. xxxvi, p. 688. Guil. de Nangiaco Vila Ludovici 
viii, p. 310. In Duchesne Ludov. 9. Guil. de Nangis Chron. p. 
517. Gesta Ludov. viii, p. 310. Chronique de Saint Denys, p. 
422. Abr3gi aaonyme de I'Histoire de France. Hist, de 
France, torn, xvii, p. 432. Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, eh. 
xxvii, p, 353. Annales Waver leienses Monast. torn, xviii, p. 210. 
Chron. Turon. p. 317. Andrenses Monast. Chron. torn, xviii, p. 
580. Joaniiis Iperii Chron. sancti Bertini, p. 609. Chronic, 
Alberici Triura Fontium, p. 796. 



CHAPTER V. 



[From A.D. 1226, to A.D. 1242.] 



At the death of Louis VIII, the monarchy 
whic h had been raised to a high degree of pow- 
er, by the skill and good fortune of PhiHp Augus- 
tus, appeared in danger of falling into that state of 
turbulent anarchy from which he had with diffi- 
culty rescued it. He had obtained great advan- 
tages over his vassals, which his son, during his 
short reign, had not had time to lose ; but those 
vassals had still the consciousness of their strength, 
and the love of that independence of which they 
had been so recently deprived. To keep them 
in their obedience, a high degree of energy was 
required in the depositaries of the royal authority, 
and that authority was confided in a woman and 
a child. 

Louis VIII had marripd on the 23rd of May, 
1200, Blanche, daughter of Alphonso IX of Cas- 
tillo ; he had eleven children by her, five of 
whom survived him. Blanche was born, accord- 
ing to Bollandus, in 1 188,* and most probably 
three or four years sooner, so that she was, at the 
death of her husband, at least thirty-eight years 

* Bollandus, 30 Mai, p. 291. 



214 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1226. 

of age. Loais, the eldest of her sons, born the 
25tli of April, 1215, was, at that time, eleven 
years and a half; Robert, the eldest of his other 
three sons, was ten years ; Alphonso, the second, 
seven ; the youngest, Charles, was only six ; and 
the daughter, Elizabeth, was only two years 
old. 

Blanche was a Spaniard, and possessed of the 
qualities common to her nation, the qualities pe- 
culiar to great minds. She was handsome ; her 
heart was ardent and tender ; religion partly oc- 
cupied it, but love was not excluded ; and her 
deportment, especially towards the king of Nar- 
varre, and the pope's legate, gave some colour of 
probability to the reports which her enemies cir- 
culated against her. Jealous of her authority, 
jealous of the affections of those whom she loved, 
even when she married her sons, she was still 
watchful to prevent their wives obtaining an as- 
cendancy over them which might interfere with 
her own ; she had, besides, inspired them with a 
high idea of her prudence and capacity. She 
possessed their love, but that love was mingled 
with fear, and even when she placed them on 
the throne, she did not accustom them to relax 
in their obedience. Although she was herself, 
probably, destitute of a literary education, which 
was in those times rarely given even to men, she 
comprehended the advantage of useful studies, 
and surrounded her sons with those who were 
the most capable of teaching them all that was 
then known. She gave to the masters whom she 
chose an authority, over the princes, as absolute 
as they could have had over the children of a 



A.D. 1227.] THE ALBIGENSES. 215 

citizen ; and as the ferula was then the only sys- 
tem of education known to the pedants, ' so, as 
the blessed king himself used to say, the afore- 
said master flogged him many times to teach him 
things of discipline.'* But above all, Blanche 
endeavoured to inspire her children with the same 
religious sentiments by which she herself vv^as ac- 
tuated ; and the education which she gave them 
contantly tended to the developement of that piety, 
and that ardent faith, which was the spring of all 
their actions. 

1227. Blanche, at the same time that she had 
to contend with her great barons, for the sovereign 
authority, and to maintain her relations with the 
king of England, found herself charged with the 
war which her husband, according to the exhort- 
ation of the holy see, had, in the preceding year, 
carried on against the Albigenses. But although 
the army of Louis VIII had been almost destroy- 
ed there by sickness, the regent had no reason to 
fear the vengeance of the inhabitants of the count- 
ship of Toulouse, to whom, under the pretence 
of their attachment to heresy, so much evil had 
been done. They were crushed under the weight 
of long-protracted calamities, and desired nothing 
so much as a short season of repose. The cardi- 
nal, Romano di Sant. Angelo, had full authority 
from the pope to regulate the ecclesiastical gov- 
ernment of the conquered country. In the begin- 
ning of January, he gave judgment upon the de- 
mand made by the citizens of Avignon, to be re- 

* Vie de St. Louis par le confesseur de la reine Marguerite, ch. 
il, p. 301. ^ 



216 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1227. 

conciled to the church. He prohibited them 
from affording any succours to the count of Tou- 
louse, or any asylum to the heretics. He con- 
demned them to a fine of a thousand marks of 
silver to the church, and of six thousand to the 
army of the crusaders. He commanded them to 
demolish their walls, their ramparts, and their 
towers, without the liberty of rebuilding them, 
unless they should obtain permission from the 
king of France, and the church. On these con- 
ditions he was willing to free them from the ex- 
communication which they had incurred ; but, at 
the same time, he destined themoney thathe had 
extorted from them, to fortifying the castle of 
Saint Andree, on the other side of the Rhone, 
which was intended to keep them in obedi 
ence."^ 

During lent, in the same year, Peter, archbish- 
op of Narbonne, presided at a council in his epis- 
copal city, the canons of which, to the number of 
twenty, were all intended to redouble the rig- 
ours of persecution against the Jews and the her- 
etics, the count of Toulouse, the count of Foix, 
and the viscount of Beziers, and to augment the 
authority of the ecclesiastics. It was there 
ordered, that a testament should not be held 
valid, unless it was signed in the presence of 
the curate ; and that, in each parish, assistants 
to the inquisitors, under the name of synodi- 
cal witnesses, should be instituted for the dis- 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, xxiv, ch. xxix, p. 364. 



A.D. 1227.] THE ALBIGENSES. 217 

coveiy of those whose faith might be suspec- 
ted. * 

In spite of the discouragement of his subjects, 
the abandonment of his alhes, and the accumula- 
tion of sacerdotal hatred, the count of Toulouse 
endeavoured to profit by the retreat of the crusa- 
ders, to attack Humbert de Beaujeu, whom 
Louis VIII had, at his departure, left as his heu- 
tenant of the province. He could only take 
from him the castle of Haute-Rive, four leagues 
from Toulouse, which he had attacked during 
the winter ;f but, this event was sufficient to ex- 
cite the French clergy to make the court of Rome 
resound with their clamours. They accused the 
queen of continuing to raise the tenths of the ec- 
clesiastical benefices, granted for five years to her 
husband, without at the same time, continuing the 
war against the heretics, which alone could ren^- 
der this exaction legitimate. They even obtain- 
ed an order from Gregory IX, who had succeed- 
en in the pontificate to Honorius III, to suspend 
the payment. [J The cardinal of Sant. Angelo, 
wdio was entirely' devoted to Blanche, found 
means to revoke the order ; but, at the same 
time, gave the queen to understand, that it was 
to her interest to continue the war. She sent 
some assistance to Humbert de Beaujeu, who by, 
the help of this reinforcement, was enabled to 
lay siege to the castle Becede in Lauraguais.|| 

* Hist, de Lariguedoc, liv, xxiv. ch. xxxii, p. 365. Concilia 
gpeneralia Labbei, torn, xi, p. 304. 

tGuill. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxvii, p. 689. 

JRaynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1227, art. 56. 

U Guill. Nagii Clironic. in spicil. torn, iii, p. 31, 



218 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1227. 

The archbishop of Narbonne, and Fouquet, bish- 
op of Toulouse, whom the Albigenses called the 
bishop of devils, proceeded to this siege. Pons 
de Villeneuve, and Ohvierde Fermes, who com- 
manded in the castle, not being able to prolong 
their defence, succeeded one night in escaping 
with part of the garrison ; the rest were either 
knocked on the head, or put to the sword by the 
conquerors. Fouquet did, however, save the 
lives of some women and children ; and he, in 
like manner, rescued from the hands of the sol- 
diers, though it was that they might perish in the 
femes, Girard de la Mote, pastor of the here- 
tics of Becede, and all those who formed his 
flock.* 

Thus, the cruelty of the persecutors was not 
yet satiated ; still it frequently displayed itself by 
punishments, and during all the period on which 
we are now entering, the repressive measures, 
adopted by the councils, acquired each year more 
severity, and gave to the inquisition an organiza- 
tion still more terrible. Nevertheless, that fanat- 
icism, which had armed the first crusaders against 
the Albigenses, was abated ; nobody now regard- 
ed Christianity as in danger from the progress of 
reform, nobody was anxious to save the church 
from the invasion of thought, and no one longed 
for the moment when he might rejoice at the 
burning of the heretics, or bathe himself in their 
blood. To an outrageous phrensy had succeeded 
a calm indifference ; yet, toleration had gained 

* Gulll. de Podio Laurentii, cap. xxxvii, p. 6S9. Prseclara 
Franc, facin. p. 775. 



A.D. 1227.] THE ALBIGENSES. 219 

nothing by the exchange. Kings, nobles, priests, 
and people were all agreed in thinking, that here- 
tics must be destroyed by fire and sword. An 
injurious name, which recalled the Bulgarian ori- 
gin of the sect, was given to all who had under- 
taken to bring back morals to their purity, faith 
to its spirituality, and the church to its original 
simphcity. A cold contempt alone was vouch- 
safed to those beings who had been animated by 
such generous sentiments, and had suffered so 
much affliction, as if they had in them nothing 
human, nothing capable of feeling, nothing with 
which the heart of man could sympathize. Their 
very punishment excited no emotion, not even 
that of hatred, because it no longer required an 
effort to crush them. 

Reason, however, b^gan afresh to attempt the 
examination of rehgious questions ; but it was not 
to those controversies treated of by the Albigen- 
ses, that attention was directed. From them the 
most undaunted speculators turned, with a well- 
founded horror. The schools of Paris had been 
continually acquiring importance ; new scholars 
flocked there, not only from France, but from all 
Europe, to attend the lessons of celebrated mas- 
ters. A numerous body of professors, who were 
indebted for their pecuniary advantages, their 
rank in society, and their fame, to the exercise of 
all the faculties of the mind, had raised themselves, 
still more than they had elevated the youths con- 
fided to their care. Erudition had made indubi- 
table progress ; skill in managing both the thoughts 
and the language in disputes, had increased with 
exercise ; it is not so certain that the understand 



220 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1227. 

ing had gained either in justness or in extent. 
The school of theology at Paris, famed through 
all Europe for its orthodoxy, placed its glory in 
maintaining that reputation without spot; yet, 
this body of teachers could not help finding itself 
in opposition to the monastic orders, who also 
undertook the work of instruction. Their rival- 
ship contributed to attach the French theologians 
to the defence of the independence of their na- 
tional church ; it was by prescribing the bounda- 
ries of the temporal and spiritual powers, by their 
oppositions to the encroachments of the court of 
Rome, that they signahzed their spirit of reform, 
and never in any examination of the doctrine, 
nor even in that of the discipline of the church. 
In the midst of the troubles of an agitated re- 
gency, with numerous risings and revolts of the 
jjarons within the realm, and threatenings and 
dano-ers from without, Blanche had the talent to 
terminate the conquest of the Albigenses, and to 
gather the fruits of the policy of Philip Augus- 
tus, of the zeal of Louis VIll, and of the fanati- 
cal fury of their subjects. The rivalship of 
Philip Hurepel, the count of Boulogne, and uncle 
of Louis IX, the enmity and distrust of the bar- 
ons, and the relationship v/hich connected her 
with Raymond Vll, did not divert her from those 
projects of aggrandizement, which she had form- 
ed in concert with the cardinal di Sant. Angelo. 
France has been indebted to her for the acquisi- 
tion of a noble province, and forgetting at what 
a price it was purchased, she has viewed with in- 
dulgence both her policy and her means of suc- 
cess. It would be unjust to attribute to individ- 



A.D. 1228.] THE ALBIGENSES. 221 

uals the errors of their age. Intolerance and 
persecuting fanaticism were virtues in the eyes of 
Blanche, and she is not responsible for the instruc- 
tion of her doctors. But cupidity, cruelty, and 
want of faith in political transactions, were sanc- 
tioned by no religious instruction. We are no 
more able to exculpate from these vices the great 
of the middle ages, than those of our own days. 
The frequency of examples cannot justify that 
which conscience reprobates. Yet the picture 
of the crimes of former ages does not excite 
sensations which are altogether painful ; it shows 
to what a degree ignorance is contrary to morality, 
and how greatly the increase of knowledge has 
been favourable to the progress of virtue. 

1228. At the commencement of the year 
1228, Raymond count of Toulouse again took 
the field, flattering himself that he should find 
the royal party discouraged by the civil wars 
with the barons, and the crusaders weakened by 
the departure of the most enthusiastic amongst 
them for the Holy Land. Guy de Montfort, 
brother of the ferocious Simon, was killed at the 
siege of Vareilles."* Raymond afterwards took 
possession of Castel Sarrazin. In the neighbour- 
hood of that place, he placed an ambush for a 
body of troops belonging to Humbert de Beau- 
jeu, and, having taken a great number of prison- 
ers, he abandoned himself to those sentiments of 
hatred and vengeance, which the horrors of the 
war had excited both in his soldiers and himself. 



* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxvii, p. 689. l^rseclara 
Franeorum facinora, p. 776. 



222 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1228. 

The captives were mutilated with an odious cruel- 
ty ; a second advantage caused additional French 
prisoners to fall into his hands, and a second time 
he treated them with the same barbarity.* Per- 
haps, also, a mistaken policy made him thus 
brave the laws of humanity. Discouragement 
had seized the hearts of the Languedocians ; 
their constancy had been exhausted by such a 
succession of combats, and so many sufferings ; 
and Raymond VII thought that he should render 
them warlike by permitting them to become fero- 
cious. But on the contrary, those who had de- 
graded themselves by taking the character of 
executioners, ceased to merit, in war, the title of 
soldiers. His success finished with his clem* 
ency. 

Humbert de Beaujeu received but little assist- 
ance from France ; the prelates, however, effected 
for him what the queen could not then undertake. 
In the middle of June, the archbishops of Auch 
and Bourdeaux arrived at his camp with a great 
member of bishops ; they had been preaching 
the cross in their respective dioceses, and they 
brought him a numerous and fanatical army.f 
Fouquet, bishop of Toulouse, had never quitted 
the crusaders, and he exceeded them all in san- 
guinary zeal. He beheved himself called to 
purify, by fire, his episcopal city, and he deter- 
mined Beaujeu to draw near to Toulouse. The 
affrighted citizens shut themselves up within their 
walls, abandoning the surrounding country, and 

*Matt. Parisii Hist, Angl, p. 294, 

t Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch, xxxviii, p, 368, 



A.D. 1228.] THE ALBIGENSES. 223 

flattering themselves still to be able by lengthen- 
ing out the war, to weary the patience of the 
besiegers. It was their own bishop, Fouquet, 
who suggested the method of wounding his people 
in what he knew to be the most sensible part, and 
of rendering this war for ever fatal to their coun- 
try. By his advice, the French captains con- 
ducted, every morning, their troops to the gates 
of Toulouse, and then retiring to the mountains, 
each day by a different route, they commanded 
them, through all the space they passed over, to 
cut down the corn, tear np the vines, destroy the 
fruit trees, and burn the houses, so that there 
remained not a vestige of the industry or of the 
riches of man. Each day the general traced in 
this manner a new radius, and, during three 
months, he uninterruptedly continued, thus me- 
thodically, to ravage all the adjacent country. 
At the end of the campaign, the city was only 
surrounded by a frightful desert, all its richest 
inhabitants were ruined, and their courage no 
longer enabled them to brave such a merciless 
war.* Some lords had already abandoned them ; 
the two brothers Olivier and Bernard de Termes 
submitted their castles, on the 21st of November, 
to the archbishop of Narbonne, and to marshal 
de Levis, who received it in the name of the king, 
of whom the brothers de Termes engaged to hold 
all the rest of their lordship. f Nearly at the 
same time, count Raymond listened to the propo- 

* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxviii, p. 690. Praeclara 
Francorum facinora. p. 776; 

t Preuves de I'Hist. de Languedoc, t. iii, p. 325, Acte No. 
182. 



224 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

sitiotis of peace which were made by the abbot 
of Grandselve ; on the 10th of December, 1228, 
he gave full powers to this abbot to negociate in 
his name with the king, the queen mother, and 
the cardinal di Sant. Angelo, engaging to ratify 
whatever treaty should obtain the consent of his 
cousin Thibaud count of Champagne, whom he 
took for arbitrator of his differences with his cous- 
in the queen. The instructions to the abbot of 
Grandselve* shew that Raymond VII, over- 
whelmed with terror as well as his subjects, no 
longer preserved any hope of defending himself. 
It might even be supposed that the victories of 
his enemies appeared to him a judgment from 
heaven, and that he thought himself obliged, in 
conscience, henceforth to share the persecuting 
fanaticism against which he so long had struggled. 
In fact, he demanded neither liberty of conscience 
for his subjects, nor the preservation of his own 
sovereignty ; he abandoned all thoughts of main- 
taining, any longer, his independence ; he con- 
sented to surrender himself disarmed, and without 
guarantee, into the hands of his enemies, and to 
leave to them the disposal of his heritage. He 
only desired to covenant for the possession of a 
small part of his states, to secure to himself not 
a sovereignty, but a revenue, which should cease 
with his life.f 

1229. Early in the year 1229 the cardinal 
legate held two provincial councils, one at Sens, 

* Preuves de Thist. de Languedoc, t. iii, p. 326. Acte No. 
183. 

t Martene Thesaurus Anecdotor. torn, i, p. 943. Preuvea de 
I'hist. Lagnuedoc, de § clxxxiii, p. 326. 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 225 

the other at Senlis, to prepare the articles relative 
to the pacification of Albigeois. He afterwards 
repaired to Meaux, where the king, the queen 
Blanche, the count Raymond VII, the deputies 
from Toulouse, the archbishop of Narbonne, and 
the principal bishops of his province successively- 
arrived. The treaty, which had been concerted 
between the cardinal di Sant. Angelo, and the 
abbot of Grandselve, was afterwards read. It 
was the most extraordinary that any sovereign 
had ever been required to sign. Each of its ar- 
ticles, says William de Puy Laurens, contained a 
concession which might alone have sufficed for 
the ransom of the count of Toulouse, had he 
been made prisoner in a universal rout of all his 
army. Raymond, nevertheless, did not hesitate 
to give his consent to it.* 

The definitive treaty was signed at Paris the 
i2th of April, 1229. By this act, Raymond 
VII abandoned to the king all that he possessed 
in the kingdom of France, and to the legate all 
that he possessed in the kingdom of Aries. After 
this universal renunciation, the king, as if by fa- 
vour, granted him, as a fief, for the remainder of 
his life, a part only of what he had taken from 
him, namely, a portion of the dioceses of Tou- 
louse, of Albigeois, and of Quercy, with the 
entire dioceses of Agenois and of Rouergue. 
These provinces, which the king restored to him, 
were, moreover, to form the portion of his daugh- 
ter Jane, then nine years of age, whom he named 

* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xxxix, p. 691. Prseclara Fran- 
corum facinora, p. 777. 

14 



226 CRUSABES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

his sole heiress, and whom he engaged to dehver 
immediately into the hands of Blanche, that she 
might bring her up under her own eyes, and af- 
terwards marry her to one of her sons at her dis • 
cretion. Blanche destined her for Alphonso, 
the third, who was likewise but nine years old. 
In accepting, for her son, the daughter of a prince 
so long proscribed, and so constantly excommu- 
nicated, Blanche sufficiently manifested, that she, 
at least, did not consider him a heretic, that she 
felt no horror at being allied to him, and that on 
the part of the court of France, the_ crusade was 
rather political than religious. Its real design 
was to obtain possession of the domains belonging 
to the most powerful of the grand vassals, though 
its ostensible object was the suppression of her- 
esy. 

Toulouse, wdth all the provinces reserved to 
Raymond VII, were, after his death, to pass to 
his daughter, and to the children which she might 
have by her marriage with one of the king's 
brothers. In failure of these, the fiefs were to 
revert to the crov/n, without ever passing to any 
other children whom Raymond VII might have 
by a new marriage. On the other hand, the re- 
mainder of his states, amounting to nearly two- 
thirds of the whole, were to be given up to the 
king, immediately after the treaty of Paris, to be 
united to the crown ; that is, the dukedoms of 
Narbonne, Beziers, Agde, Maguelonne, Usez and 
Viviers, as well as all that the count possessed or 
pretended to possess in Veiay, Gevaudan, and 
the lordship of Lodeve ; together with the / fief 



A^D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 22T 

of the marshall of Levis in the Touloussain, with 
the half of the Albigeois.* 

These were but a small part of the sacrifices 
to which Raymond VII was obliged to submit. 
He promised to pay twenty thousand marks of 
silver in four years, half for the benefit of the 
churches, whilst the remainder should be em- 
ployed in rebuilding the fortifications of the places, 
which he gave up to his enemies ; to restore to 
all the ecclesiastics the whole of the possessions 
which had been taken from them during the war ; 
to raze the walls and fill up the ditches of Tou- 
louse, whilst, at the same time, he should receive 
a French garrison into the Narbonnese castle, 
which served as a citadel to that great city ; to 
raze, likewise, the fortifications of thirty others 
of his cities or fortresses ; to deliver eight of 
them into the custody of the king : he also pro- 
mised never to raise any fortification in any other 
place in his states ; to dismiss all the routiers, or 
those soldiers who made a trade of hiring them- 
selves to any who wished to enrol them ; in a 
word, to oblige all his subjects to swear, not only 
to observe this treaty, but also that they would 
turn their arms against him if he should ever de- 
part from it. Even this was not all ; Raymond 
VII was compelled to promise that he would 
henceforth make war against all those who, to 
this moment, had remained faithful to him, and 
especially against the count of Foix ; and that 
he would pay to every individual who should ar- 

* Hist. gf'n. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xlvi, p. 375. Curita 
Anales de Aragon. torn, i, lib. ii, cli. Ixxxv, f. 121, 



228 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

rest a heretic, two marks for each of his subjects 
who might be thus carried before the tribunals. 
It appears, however, that Raymond felt himself 
so debased by these extorted conditions, that he 
himself demanded to be retained a prisoner at 
the Louvre, whilst they were beginning to exe- 
cute the treaty ; and that he submitted to the 
obhgation of serving five years in the Holy Land, 
when he should leave his prison, that he might 
not be the witness of the entire ruin of his coun- 
try.^ Nevertheless, the love of repose, the 
dread of the humiliations he might have to en- 
dure in an army of fanatics, qr perhaps some new 
hopes, engaged him afterwards to free himself 
from this last condition. 

The union of part of Albigeois to the domain 
of the crown, and the submission of all the rest 
to those fanatical priests who had called thither 
the crusaders, were the forerunners of inexpressi- 
ble calamities to these provinces. But, that 
which perhaps exceeded all the others, was the 
permanent establishment of the inquisition. This 
was principally the work of the council, assem- 
bled at Toulouse, in the month of November, 
1229, and composed of the archbishops of Nar- 
bonne, of Bourdeaux, and of Auch, with their 
suffragans.f In the month of the preceding 
April, an ordonnance of Louis IX had renewed, 
in the countries which had fallen under his do- 
minion, the severest pursuits against the here- 
tics.! 



* Preuves de I'Hist. de Languedoc, § clxxxiv, p. 329 et seq. 
t Concilia generalia Labbei, tonii xi, p. 425. 
4:Ordomi. de France, t. i, p. 5O4 Hist. gen. de Languedoc, t. 
iii. liv. xxiv, ch. liii, p. 378* 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 229 

The inquisition was not, at this epoch, aban- 
doned solely to the Dominicans. It was only by 
a slow progress, during all the reign of Saint 
Louis, that it was brought to that complete and 
fearful organization, with which a fanatical party 
desires, at this day, its reestablishment in Spain. 
The council of 1229, composed chiefly of pre- 
lates, had sought to render it subordinate to the 
episcopal power. The bishops were to depute 
into each province a priest, and two or three 
laics, to seek after, (having first engaged them- 
selves by oath,) all the heretics and their abettors : 
' Let them visit carefully,' says the first canon, 
* each house in their parish, and the subterranean 
chambers, which any suspicion shall have caused 
to be remarked ; let therli examine all the out- 
houses, the retreats under the roofs, and all the 
secret places, which we order them, besides, eve- 
ry where to destroy : if they find there any 
heretics, or any of their abettors or concealers, 
let them in the first place provide that they may 
not escape ; then let them, with all haste, de- 
nounce them to the archbishop, the bishop, the 
lord of the place or his bailiffs, that they may be 
punished according to their deserts.'* 

An instruction as to the manner of proceeding 
against heretics, was composed before the end of 
the same century, for the use of the inquisitors. 
Some extracts from this curious book, published 
by the fathers Martene and Durand, of the con- 
gregation of Saint Maur, will give a better un- 
derstanding respecting an institution which hence- 

* CoocUiam Toloeanum, ch. i. p. 428. 



230 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

forward exercised so great an influence over the 
church and people of France. ' In this manner,' 
it is said at the beginning, ' the inquisitors proceed 
in the provinces of Carcassonne and Toulouse. 
First, the accused or suspected of heresy is cited ; 
when he appears, he is sworn upon the holy Gos- 
pels, that he will fully say all that he knows for 
a truth, respecting the crime of heresy or Vau- 
doisie, as well concerning himself as others, as 
well concerning the living, as the dead. If he 
conceals or denies any thing, he is put in prison, 
and kept there until he shall have confessed ; 
but if he says the truth, (that is, if he accuses 
either others or himself) his confession is diligent- 
ly written down by a notary public. . . . When a 
sufficient number have confessed to make a ser- 
mon' (thus they then called, what we at this day 
name, from a Portuguese word, auto da fe) 'the 
inquisitors convoke, in a suitable place, some ju- 
ris-consults, minor-brothers, and preachers, and 
the ordinaries, (the bishops) without whose coun- 
sel, or that of their vicars, no person ought to be 
condemed. When the council is assembled, the 
inquisitors shall submit to it a short extract from 
the confession of each person, but suppressing 
his name. They shall say, for example, a certain 
person, of such a diocese, has done what follows, 
after which the counsellors reply, let the inquisi- 
tors impose upon him an arbitrary penance, or 
let this person be immured, or in fine, let him be 
delivered to the secular arm. After which they 
are all cited for the following Sunday. On this 
day, the inquisitors, in the presence of the pre- 
lates, the abbots, the bailiffs, and all the people, 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 231 

cause those to be first called, who have confessed 
and persisted in their confession ; for, if they re- 
tract, they are sent back to prison, and theirfaults 
only are recited. 

' They begin with those who are to have arbitra- 
ry penances : to thern they give crosses, they im- 
pose pilgrimages, greater or smaller according to 
their faults ; to those who have perjured them- 
selves, they give double crosses. All these hav- 
ing gone out with their crosses, they recite the 
faults of those who are to be immured, making 
them rise, one after the other, and each remain 
standing whilst his confession is read. When it 
is finished, the inquisitor seats himself, and 
gives his sentence sitting, first in Latin, then in 
French. 

'Finally they recite the faults of the relapsed, 
and the sentence being pronounced, they are de- 
livered Nevertheless, those who are deliv- 
ered as relapsed, are not to be burned the same 
day they are delivered ; but on the contrary, they 
Ought to be engaged to confess themselves, and 
receive the eucharist, if they require it, and if they 
give signs of true repentance, for thus wills the 
lord pope.'* 

But this was only the external form of pro- 
cedure. An inquisitor, of the same period, has 
given a more detailed instruction to his brethren, 
respecting the manner of directing the interro- 
gatories. This instruction, also, has been 
printed by the same two Benedictine fathers, 

* Doctrina de modo procedendi contra hsereticos. Thes. anee- 
doL t. V. p> 1795. 



232 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

in a collection of religious writings ; it is worr 
thy of being placed entire under the eyes of 
the reader, , and it is not without regret, that 
we confine ourselves to giving short extracts 
from it. 

' Even he who is the most profoundly plunged 
in heresy,' says the anonymous author, ' may 
sometimes he brought back, by the fear of death, 
or the hope that he shall be permitted to Hve, if 
he confess sincerely the errors which he has learn- 
ed, and if he denounce any others whom he may 
know to belong to this sect. If he refuses to do 
it, let him be shut up in prison, and given to un- 
derstand, that there are witnesses against him, 
and that if he be once convicted by witnesses, 
there will be no mercy for him, but he will be 
delivered to death. At the same time let his 
food be lessened, for such fear and suffering will 
contribute to humble him. Let none of his ac- 
complices be permitted to approach him, lest 
they encourage him, or teach him to answer wdth 
artifice, and not to betray any one. Let no oth- 
er approach him, unless it be, from time to time, 
two adroit behevers, who may advise him cau- 
tiously, and as if they had compassion upon him, 
to deliver himself from death, to confess where he 
has erred and upon what points, and who may 
promise him that if he do this he shall escape be- 
ing burned. For the fear of death, and the love 
of life, sometimes soften a heart, which cannot be 
affected in any other manner. Let them speak 
to him also in an encouraging manner, saying, 
Be not afraid to confess, if you have gven credit 
to these men when they said such and such 



A..D. 1^229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 233 

things, because you believed them virtuous. If 
you heard them willingly, if you assisted them 
with your property, if you confessed yourself to 
them, it toas because you loved all whom you be- 
lieved to be good people, and because you knew 
nothing ill respecting them. The same might 
happen to men much wiser than you, who might 
also be deceived by them. If he begins then to sof- 
ten, and to grant that he has, in some place, heard 
these teachers speak concerning the Gospels 
or the Epistles, you must then ask him, cautious 
ly, if these teachers believed such and such things 
for example, if they denied the existence of pur- 
gatory, or the efficacy of prayers for the dead, or 
if they pretended that a wicked priest, bound by 
sin, cannot absolve others, or what they say about 
the sacraments of the church ? Afterwards, you 
must ask them, cautiously, whether they regard 
this doctrine as good and true, for he who grants 
this, has thereby confessed his heresy. . . .Where- 
as if you had asked him bluntly whether he be- 
lieved the same things, he would not have an- 
swered, because he would have suspected that 
you wished to take advantage of him and accuse 
him as a heretic .... These are very subtle fox- 
es, and you can only take them by a crafty sub- 
tihty.' * 

We will add here a last instruction given by 
the inquisitor, the author of this work to his bro- 
ther, drawn from his personal experience. 
* Note,' says he, ' that the inquisitor ought al- 

* Tractatiis de Haeresi pauperum de Lugduno. Thes. Anecdot. 
t. V, p.1787. 



234 CRUSADES AGAINST [ A.D. 1229. 

ways to suppose a fact, without any proof, and 
only inquire after the circumstances of the fact. 
For example, he"should say, How many times hast 
thou confessed thyself to the heretics ? or, in what 
chamber have the heretics slept in thy house ? or 
similar things.' 

' In like manner the inquisitor may, from time to 
time, consult a book, as if he had the life of the 
heretic, written there, and all the questions that 
he was to put to him.' 

^ Likewise, when a heretic confesses himself to 
him, he ought to impose upon him the duty of ac- 
cusing his accomplices, otherwise he would not 
give a sign of true penitence.' 

' Liliewise, when a heretic either does not ful- 
ly confess his errors, or does not accuse his ac- 
complices, you must say to him in order to terrify 
him, — Very well, we see how it is. Think of 
thy soul, and fully renounce heresy, for thou art 
about to die, and nothing remains but to receive 
with true penitence all that shall happen to thee. 
And if he then says : Since I must die, I had 
rather die in my ow^n faith than in that of the 
church ; then it is certain that his repentance 
was feigned, and he may be delivered up to jus- 
tice.'* 

We have thought it our duty to dwell the lon- 
ger on this new method of procedure against the 
heretics, and on the instructions given to the 
judges for the examination of consciences, be- 
cause the form which was prescribed to them for 

* Tractatus de Haeresi. Thes. Anecd. torn, v, p. 1793. 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 235 

their interrogatories, was soon after introduced 
into the criminal procedure, where it produced a 
revolution in the state of France. It was by ar- 
tifices similar to these, by such moral tortures, 
that it was endeavoured to extort confession from 
the accused, as soon as the suppression of the ju- 
dicial combats rendered the office of the judge 
more complit^ated. The priests, as more sldlful, 
as more accustomed by the confessional to pene- 
trate into the secrets of conscience, gave the ex- 
ample, and in some measure established the theo- 
ry of interrogatories. Nevertheless, it appears 
that at this period they had not added torture, 
properly so called, to their other means of inves- 
tigation. There is no mention made of it in 
either of the instructions for the inquisitors, which 
we have under our eyes. Half a century later, 
its use became as frequent as it was atrocious, 
both in the civil and ecclesiastical tribunals. The 
interrogatory of the suspected, was not the only 
part of the procedure in which the practice of 
the inquisition influenced the courts of justice ; 
the inquest by witnesses received from it also a 
new character. Every thing had been public in 
the ancient French jurisprudence, both under the 
Merovingians, where the citizens judged each 
other in their malli, and under the first of the 
Capets, in the baronial courts, where the peers 
of the accused sate in judgment upon him. But 
the monks, on the contrary, surrounded them- 
selves with thick darkness ; all was secret in their 
inquests ; they suppressed the confrontation of 
witnesses, and even concealed, from the accased, 



236 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229 

the names of those who had deposed against 
them.* 

The heretics supported their doctrines by the 
authority of the holy Scriptures ; the first indi- 
cation of heresy was, therefore, considered to be 
the citation either of the Epistles or the Gospels ; 
secondly, any exhortation against lying ; and fin- 
ally, any signs of compassion shown to the pris- 
oners of the inquisition.! The council of Tou- 
louse for the first time decided, that the reading 
of the holy books should not be permitted to the 
people. ' We prohibit, says the fourteenth ca- 
non, p. 430, the laics from having the books of the 
Old and New Testament ; unless it be at most that 
any one wishes to have, from devotion, a psalter, a 
breviary for the divine ofiices, or the hours of 
the blessed Mary ; but we forbid them, in the 
most express manner, to have the above books 
translated into the vulgar tongue. '."j: The follow- 
ing article merits also attention. * We command 
that whoever shall be accused of heresy or noted 
with suspicion shall be deprived of the assistance 
of a physician. Likewise when a sick person 
shall have received the holy communion of his 
priest, it is our will that he be watched with the 
greatest care to the day of his death or convales- 
cence, that no heretic or one suspected of heresy 
may have access to him.' 

The establishment of the inquisition in Lan- 
guedoc, was not however, followed by a number 

* Guill. de Podio Laurentii, ch. xl, p. 692. 
*Tractatus de Haeres. Anecdot. Thes. torn, v, p. 1784 — 6. 
^Labbei Concil. Tolosan. t. xi, p. 427 et seq. Fleury Hist; 
Eccles. liv. Ixxix, n. 58. 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 237 

of executions proportioned to the expectations of 
the orthodox. Many of the converted were 
obhged to wear upon their breast two crosses of 
a different colour from their clothes, to quit places 
suspected of heresy, and to establish themselves 
in cities zealous for the catholic faith, where the 
eyes of all were drawn upon them by the costume 
to which they had been condemned. Others, 
who were regarded as more culpable, or more 
suspected, were, in spite of their conversion, im- 
prisoned for the remainder of their lives, or, in 
the language of the inquisition, were immured. 
But as for those who were called perfect here- 
tics, or the relapsed, it became very difficult to 
find any in the province. It was in vain that the 
bishop Fouquet, having converted one of the 
most celebrated of the sect, William de Sohers, 
caused him to be reestablished, that he might 
testify his zeal in denouncing his ancient fellow- 
religionists. It was in vain that he ordered, by 
a most particular favour, that the testimony of 
this new convert should be considered equal to 
that of one of the faithful who had never erred.* 
The reformed church had already been destroyed 
by the preceding massacres ; some few individuals 
who were timid, and unstable in their faith, had 
alone been able to escape by frequently denying 
their belief. It was upon them, that the inquisi- 
tion exercised, henceforward, all its severity. 
Terror became extreme, suspicion universal, all 
teaching of the proscribed doctrine had ceased, 
the very sight of a book made the people trem- 

* Guill. de Podio Lauientii, ch. x!, p. 692. 



^38 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

ble, and ignorance was for the greater number a 
salutary guarantee. 

The reform had arisen fi-om the first advance- 
ment in Uterature, from the first apphcation of 
reason to rehgious instruction ; by thickening the 
darkness, by striking the minds of men with ter- 
ror, they could not fail to arrest this fermentation, 
and to bring back their consciences to a blind 
submission and to their hereditary belief. 

By a strange contrast, the university of Tou- 
louse sprung from this persecution. It was found- 
ed with the inquisition, and by those who wished 
to inthral the human mind. But it was the de- 
sire of the churchy that, in the very place where 
the reprobated doctrines had been taught, there 
should henceforth be no other teachers than her 
own, nor any other study but that of the ortho- 
dox theolgy. Consequently the count of Tou- 
louse was enjoined to maintain in his caphal, for 
ten years, at his own expense, professors and 
masters of theology and canon law. But it is 
impossible at the same time to excite and restrain 
the human mind. Encouragement given to one 
science is favourable to others. The school of 
canon law, which was founded at Toulouse and 
which collected together a number of young men, 
shewed the necessity of estabhshing also a school 
of civil law, then another for literature, and the 
university was thus gradually completed, in some 
respects in spite of those to whom it owed its 
foundation.* 

1229. Whilst Raymond VII delivered up his 

* Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. li, p. 377. 



A,D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 239 

country to its persecutors, he submitted himself 
on the 12th of April to the most humihating 
penance. He repaired, with his feet naked, and 
with only his shirt and trowsers, to the church of 
Notre-Dame at Paris ; there the cardinal, Roma- 
no di Sant. Angelo, met him, and, after adminis- 
tering the discipline upon his naked shoulders, 
conducted him to the foot of the grand altar, 
where he declared thajt, on account of his humili- 
ty and devotion, he pronounced his absolution ; 
under this condition, however, that he should 
again fall under the preceding excommunication 
if he failed to observe the treaty of Paris. Ray- 
mond was afterwards confined, for six weeks, in 
his prison of the Louvre, whilst his daughter was 
delivered to the king's commissioners, his strong 
castles were opened to them, and the wall of his 
capital, to the extent of three thousand feet, was 
thrown down. On his release from captivity, 
Louis IX received his homage for the fiefs which 
still remained to him, knighted him on the 3rd of 
June, the day of Pentecost, and allowed him to 
return to his country.* 

As long as the bishop Fouquet lived, the resi- 
dence of Raymond VII at Toulouse was embit- 
tered by the ferocity of a prelate, who thought 
that he could only honor God by sacrificing hu- 
man victims, and who had long been obliged to 
tear from their lord those w^hom he demanded to 
offer upon his altars. Daily denunciations, and 
every kind of humihation, caused the count of 
Toulouse to live in continual dread of new ex- 

*Hist. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv,ch. Iviii, p. 380. 



MO CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D 1229. 

communications J and a new crusade. Happily, 
Fouquet at last died, on Christmas-day, 1231^ 
after an episcopate of twenty-eight years, and 
Raymond VII then experienced a diminution of 
the severities to which he had hitherto been ex- 
posed.* He obtained from the court of Rome, 
first a respite, and afterwards a dispensation from 
proceeding to the Holy Land, according to his 
engagement ; and if he could succeed in silenc- 
ing the reproaches of honour and conscience, he 
might, from that time, enjoy a sort of peace, in 
the domains which were still spared to him. 

Notwithstanding the engagement which count 
Raymond had entered into, and which he partly 
executed, to make war upon the count of Foix, 
he continued to interest himself for that ancient 
ally, and succeeded in obtaining peace for him, 
on the 16th of June, 1229, on conditions anala- 
gousto his own.f But his other ally, the young 
Trencavel, heir of the viscounties of Beziers and 
of Carcassonne, could obtain no mercy. All his 
heritage was already united to the domain of the 
crown, and he had no resource but to retire to 
the court of the king of Aragon. On the other 
hand, two French houses were formed in Albi- 
geois, and preserved their establishment as a mon- 
ument of the crusade. One was that of Simon 
de Montfort, whose nephew Philip, son of Guy, 
obtained in fief from Louis IX, the lordship of 
Castres, or that part of Albigeois, situated on the 

* Prseclara Francor. facinora, p. 778. Guil. de Podio Laur. 
c. xli, p. 693. 

t Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. Ixi, p. 381. P. de 
Marca, Hist, de Beam. liv. viii, ch. xxi, § viii — x, p. 756. 



A.D 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 241 

left of the Tarn ; the other was that of Levis, 
who retained, under the name of a mareschal's 
estate, that portion of the diocese of Toulouse, 
which was afterwards detached to form the dio- 
cese of Mirepoix and Pamiers.* 

The pacification of Albigeois, and the submis- 
sion of Raymond of Toulouse made also a change 
in the political state of the provinces situated on 
the left side of the Rhone, or in the kingdom of 
Aries, Raymond VII possessed there an exten- 
sive domain, designated by the name of Mar- 
quisate of Provence, out of the fragments of 
which was afterwards formed the principality of 
Orange and the countship of Venaissin. He had 
ceded this territory to the pope, and to cardinal 
Romano di Sant. Angelo, in his name, but as it 
was then suffering under a famine, the legate gave 
the pope to understand that the charge of it 
would be burdensome, and that the church would 
be a gainer, by remitting it to queen Blanche. 
Adam de Milly, vicegerent of the king of France, 
in the province of Narbonne, and the seneschal 
of Beaucaire were therefore charged with the 
administration of these provinces, till the church 
should restore the possession to Raymond VII.-j- 
Nevertheless, the cession made to 4;he church by 
this prince, of that part of his domain, is almost 
the sole origin of the pretensions of the court of 
Rome to the sovereignty of the countship of 
Venaissin. if 

* Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. liv, p. 378. 
•j- Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, cii. Ixvi, p. 385. Preuves, § 
excvi, p. 346. 
$ Bouche, Hist, de Provence, liv. ix, sect, ii, p. 223. 

15 



242 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1229. 

The queen Blanche had by the treaty of Paris 
united to the states of her son a very important 
province, which for the first time placed the do- 
main of the crown of France in communication 
with the Mediterranean Sea, on which it display- 
ed about thirty leagues of coast. The acquisi- 
tion of fields covered with the richest harvests of 
the South, of cities which had been animated by 
commerce and industry, of a population which 
had already developed its understanding and tast- 
ed of liberty, really augmented the royal authori- 
ty more than any other fief of the same extent 
in a less favoured climate could have done. It 
would appear however that Blanche hoped to 
conceal from the eyes of the vassals of the crown 
and from her rivals the importance of these ac- 
quisitions, for she neither formed a new adminis- 
tration, nor appointed new officers, to govern her 
conquests. Louis VIII, after taking possession 
of Beaucaire and Carcassonne, had instrusted to 
a seneschal the command of each of these cities. 
Blanche extended their jurisdiction, so that they 
might embrace all the countries which she had 
obtained from the count of Toulouse. The re- 
mainder of Languedoc which had been left to 
Raymond VII was not finally united to the crown 
till the year 1271, and the death of count Ray- 
mond's daughter.* 

All kinds of oppression now pressed at once 
upon the people. They suffered at the same 
time, from the arbitrary extent and the capricious 
exercise of the royal authority, from the power 

*Hist. de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. xlvi, p. 375* 



A.D. 1231.] THE ALBIGENSES. 243 

of the nobles, from the power of the priests, and 
from the power of the proprietors of the soil, 
w^ho claimed, also, a property in the persons of 
their villains. But in this state of universal suf- 
fering, the people of France, as well as those of 
the rest of Europe, appeared to resign themselves 
to the ills which were inflicted on their bodies, 
and only demanded liberty for their souls. The 
sanctuary of conscience was the only one the en- 
trance to which they still endeavoured to defend, 
surrounded as they were by such a host of tyran- 
nies. We cannot reflect without emotion, that 
tormented by necessities, by cares, and by sor- 
rows, the independence of the mind was the only 
boon they demanded, and that this was refused 
them by their suspicious masters, with the same 
unfeeling cruelty as the rest. 

1231 — 1236. The reform which had com- 
menced in Albigeois had been extinguished there 
by the arms of half Europe. Blood never ceas- 
ed to flow, nor the flames to devour their victims 
in these provinces now abandoned to the dark 
fanaticism of the inquisitors. But that terror 
which had dispersed the heretics, had also scat- 
tered sparks through all Europe, by v/hich the 
torch of reason mio^ht be again rekindled. No 
voice, no outward appearance announced the 
preaching of reform, or troubled the public tranquil- 
lity. Yet, the proscribed Albigenses, who, far from 
their country, had found an asylum in the cottage 
of the peasant, or the poor artisan, whose labours 
they shared in profound obscurity, had taught 
their hosts to read the gospel in common, to pray 
in their native tongue without the ministry of 



244 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1231. 

priests, to praise God, and gratefully submit to 
the chastisements which his hand inflicted, as the 
means of their sanctification. In vain did the 
inquisition believe that it had compelled human 
reason to submission, and estabhshed an invariable 
rule of faith. In the midst of the darkness which 
it had created, it saw, all at once, some luminous 
points appear where it would least have expected 
them. Its efforts to extinguish, served only to 
scatter them, and no sooner had it conquered, 
than it was compelled to renew the combat. 

Gregory IX, w^ho had deemed the very soil of 
Languedoc polluted, by its having produced so 
many sectaries, and that the count of Toulouse 
could not be innocent, whilst he had so many 
heretics amongst his subjects, all at once discov- 
ered, with alarm, that even at Rome he was sur- 
rounded with heretics. To give an example to 
Christendom, he caused a great number of them 
to be burned before the gates of Santa Maria 
Majora ; he afterwards imprisoned, in the con- 
vents of la Cava, and of the Monte Cassino, those 
who were priests or clerks, and who had been 
publicly degraded, with those that had given 
signs of penitence.* At the same time, he caus- 
ed the senator of Rome to promulgate an edict, 
which determined the different punishments to be 
assigned to the heretics, to those who encouraged 
them, to those who should give them an asylum, 
and to those who neglected to accuse them ; al- 
ways dividing the confiscations between the spy 

* Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. A. 1231, xiii et xiv, p. 415. Rich- 
ardi de Sane. Germane Chr. t. vii, p. 1206. Vita Gregorii IX, 
Car dinala. Aizgcn'w, U iii, p. 578. 



A.D. 1231.] THE ALBIGENSES. 245 

who denounces, and the judge who condemns, 
that the scaffolds might never be left without vic- 
tims ; a combination which the Roman court has 
not renounced to this day.* He sent the sena- 
tors' edict and his own bull to the archbishop of 
Milan, to engage him to follow his example. He 
afterwards profited by his recent reconciliation 
with Frederic 11, to announce to him, that Cath- 
arins, Paterins, Poor of Lyons, and other here- 
tics, formed in the school of the Albigenses, had, 
at the same time, appeared in Lombardy and in 
the two Sicilies, and to obtain from his friendship 
an edict which has gained him the eulogium of 
the annahst of the church, and has been deposit- 
ed in the pontifical archives. By this edict, the 
emperor commanded all podestats and other 
judges, immediately to deliver to the flames every 
man who should be convicted of heresy by the 
bishop of his diocese, and to pull out the tongue 
of those to wiiom the bishop should think it pro- 
per to show favour, that they might not corrupt 
others, by attempting to justify themselves.f 
After having thus raged in Italy against the fugi- 
tive Albigenses and their disciples, Gregory IX 
did not forget to pursue them in France. He 
wrote to the archbishop of Bourges, and to the bish- 
op of Auxerre, to exhort them to show themselves 
worthy of the sacred ordination they had receiv- 
ed, by committing to the flames all the heretics 
that had been discovered at la Charite upon the 
Loire. J 



^ Capitula Annibaldi Senatoris ap, Baynaldi. Ann. Eccles. 
1231, 16 et 17. 
i Raynaldi AnnaL Eccles. 1231, § 18. 
t Ibid, § 23. 



246 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1232, 

The pope might have concluded, from seeing 
the apostles of the Albigensian reformation spread 
through a great part of Europe, that he had but 
ill served his church, by granting them no respite 
in their own country. He did not, however, 
reason thus, but on the contrary, endeavoured to 
redouble the ardour of the persecutions in the 
countship of Toulouse, by giving Raymond VII 
to expect that he would, on this condition, restore 
to him the marquisate of Provence. Raymond, 
either converted or terrified, no longer refused 
any act of inquisition or of cruelty against his 
unhappy subjects. In 1232 he consented to as- 
sociate himself with the new bishop of Toulouse, 
to surprise by night a house in which they dis- 
covered nineteen relapsed men and women, whom 
they caused to perish in the flames.* Notwith- 
standing this shameful condescension, the condi- 
tion of count Raymond was scarcely ameliorated. 
Sometimes he was suspected by the bishops of 
his states, of not seconding them sincerely in their 
persecutions. Sometimes it pleased them to 
humble him, only to imitate their predecessors, or 
perhaps, to enrich themselves with his spoils. 
Gregory IX was himself obhged to recommend 
him to the bishop of Tournay, his legate in the 
province, inviting him ' to water him kindly, as a 
young plant, and to nourish him with the milk of 
the church. '■[• 

Others of the Albigenses had found a refuge 
in the province of Gascony, w^hich depended on 

*Hist. deLanguedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. Ixxxi, p. 392. 
t Gregorii IX epistola in torn. XI. Concil. Labbei ep. xxiii, 
p. 361. ep. xxvii, p. 363. 



A.D. 1232.] THE ALBIGENSES. 247 

the king of England, but where the authority of 
the government was ahnost absolutely disregard- 
ed, so that the heretics, masters of the strono- 
castles, defended themselves by open force. Gre- 
gory IX wrote to the knights of Saint James of 
Galicia, to exterminate them with fire and sword, 
and he charged the archbishops of Auch and of 
Bourdeaux, to give every kind of succour to these 
knights.* 

Rome was soon after alarmed by the news, 
that the same reform, which had been so often 
extinguished, yet was always breaking out afresh, 
had first appeared in the centre of Germany, and 
that the city of Stettin was subjected to those 
same heretics, who, as they thought, had been 
extirpated in Languedoc. Gregory addressed 
bulls to the bishops of Minden, of Lubeck, and of 
Rachhasbourg in Styria, to induce them to preach 
up a crusade against the heretics. f In order to 
excite greater horror against these sectaries, the 
most fearful things were related concerning them, 
which excited as much astonishment as they did 
abomination. A hideous toad, said the pope, 
was presented at once to the adoration and the 
caresses of the initiated. The same being, who 
was no other than the devil, afterwards took, suc- 
cessively, difi:erent form.s, all equally revolting, 
and all offered to the salutations of his worship- 
pers. J Such an accusation could not fail of suc- 
cess. The fanatics took arms in crowds, under 



*Ravnaldi Ann. Eccles. 1232, § xxvi, p. 4S0. 
fRa'vnaldi Ann. Eccles. 12.32, § viii, 427. 
tEpistolae Gregorii IX apud Raynald. Anu. Eccles.1233, § xlii, 
p. 447. 



248 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1233. 

the conduct of the German bishops. The duke 
of Brabant and the count of Holland joined them, 
and took the command of this army of the cross. 
Those amongst the sectaries, who were not in a 
condition to carry arms, or who had not taken re- 
fuge in the strong places, were first brought to 
judgment ; and, in the year 1233, 'an innumera- 
ble multitude of heretics was burned ahve, through 
all Germany ; a still greater number was convert- 
ed.' * The army of the crusaders afterwards 
marched against Stettin ; the sectaries had the 
boldness to arrest them in the open field ; but 
six thousand of them w^ere destroyed in the 
combat, others were driven into the Oder and 
drowned, and the whole race was extermina- 
ted, f 

Gregory IX, rejoicing in his success, thought 
he might now occupy himself with converting the 
powerful military colony of Saracens, which Fre- 
deric II had estabhshed at Nocera. As these 
Mussulmans spoke the Italian language, he com- 
missioned the Dominican friars to go and preach 
Christianity :f. to them. But Frederic, wdio had 
already disputed with the pope, and who very 
well knew that he might quarrel with hhn again, 
was not greatly pleased with these proselyting ef- 
forts to shake the fidelity of the only soldiers of 
his army who were not dependent upon the monks. 
Rehgion was with him only a branch of politics, 
and after having established, in each province, 

* Concilium Moguntium contra Stadingos in Labbei Concil. gen. 
t. xi, p. 478. 
t Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1234, § xliii, p. 462. 
j Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § xxiv, p. 443. 



A.D. 1233.] THE ALBIGENSES. 249 

and in each city of the two Sicilies, a tribunal 
composed of a priest and a laic, for the burning 
of the heretics, he had brought before this tribu- 
nal all the rebels whom he had vanquished ; and, 
amongst others, had burned, to the great scandal 
of the holy father, some insurgents at Messina, 
who were guilty of no other heresy, than that of 
having resisted his will.* 

Gregory IX, therefore, turned towards France, 
the only country in Christendom where persecu- 
tion was unmitigated, and fully satisfied his heart. 
It was there that he established that tribunal to 
which he confided the defence of the faith, ren- 
dering it independent, not only of the civil power, 
but also of the prelates and all the secular clergy. 
The family of Saint Dominic, or the order of the 
preachers, known in France under the name of 
Jacobins, "which this father had founded, appeared 
to Gregory fittest to receive this trust. Saint 
Dominic died at Boulogne on the 6th of August, 
1221. He protested on his death bed, in the 
presence of his brethren, that he had preserved 
his virginity to that hour. Such chastity in a 
monk w^as reckoned a thing hitherto unheard of, 
and almost miraculous ; and the indefatigable 
zeal, with which he had consecrated his life to 
the extermination of the heretics, was greatly ad- 
mired. On the 13th of July, 1233, Gregory IX 
commissioned three priests to inquire into the 
miracles which had been wrought by the invoca- 
tion of Saint Dominic, or around his tomb, and 



* Gregorii epist. ad Freder. apud Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233) 
§ xxxiiij xxxiv, p. 445. 



250 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1233. 

upon the 3rd of July, 1234, his canonization was 
definitively pronounced.* 

It was at the same period when the court of 
Rome was occupied with the canonization of 
Saint Dominic, that it published, in the month of 
April, 1233, the bull by which it confided to the 
Dominicans alone the exercise of the Inquisition, 
under pretence of preventing the bishops from 
being interrupted in the exercise of their pastoral 
functions. The provinces of Bourges, Bourdeaux, 
Narbonne, Auch, Vienne, Aries, Aix, and> Em- 
brun, which comprehended all that part of France 
where the Provencal language was spoken, were 
particularly confided to them, through their auth- 
ority, and power to proceed by sentence against 
the accused, extended over the whole kingdom.f 
Gregory IX the same year addressed a great 
number of letters to Louis IX, exhorting him 'to 
unite his zeal with that of the monks of the order 
of preachers, and to inflict upon the relapsed her- 
etics, convicted by the inquisitors, their merited 
punishments. '."f He also recommended the Dom- 
inicans to all the prelates of the kingdom, to the 
counts of Toulouse, and of Foix, and to all the 
other counts, viscounts, barons, and seneschals, of 
France, with all the barons of Aquitaine, praying 
them to favour these monks in the execution of 
their commission. The bishop of Tournay, le- 
gate of the holy see,, to whom Gregory IX had 
committed the final organization of the inquisi- 

*Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § xxxix, p. 446 et 1234, § xxiv, 
p. 458. 

t Chi-on. Guillelmi de Podio Laur. ch. xliii, p. 694. 
t Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1233, § lix, p. 450. 



A.D. 1233.] THE ALBIGENSES. 251 

tion, named two Dominicans at Toulouse, and two 
in each city of the province, to form the tribunal 
of the faith.* He gave them an instruction in 
which he enumerated the errors of the heretics, 
and the series of questions by which, without 
alarming them, they might be Jarought to impli- 
cate themselves sufficiently, or to denounce their 
accomplices. In the exposition made by the 
bishop of Tournay, of the errors of the Albigen- 
ses, we find nearly all the principles upon which 
Luther and Calvin founded the reformation of the 
sixteenth century. Thus the Albigenses did not 
believe in transubstantiation, in the efficacy of in- 
dulgences, in the vahdity of absolution, or in the 
inability of those, who were not priests, to perform 
the mysteries of rehgion. But the bishop of 
Tournay pretends, that the heretics mingled with 
these articles of belief, which he denounces as their 
peculiar tenets, absurd, disgusting, or atrccicus 
practices, which he also details, to render them 
odious to the populace. f 

Whilst the bishop of Tournay was labouring at 
the new organization of the inquisition it appeared 
to him that the count of Toulouse shewed neither 
sufficient severity nor activity in the pursuit of 
heresy. He therefore accused him to the king of 
not having fully executed the orders of the holy 
see, or the treaty of Paris. In the autumn of 
1233, Raymond VII was constrained to repair to 
Melun, with the legate, the archbishop of Nar- 
bonne, and many other bishops, to hold a confer- 

*Hist. de Languedoo, liv. xxiv, c. Ixxxvii, p. 394. 
t Preuves de I'Hist. de Languedoc, No. ccxiv, p.371. 



252 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1233. 

ence with Louis IX, and his mother. At that 
meeting the inquisition received a new sanction 
from the authority of the king. Raymond sub- 
scribed the statutes which were presented to him. 
By those statutes, which were afterwards pub- 
hshed in his name and have come down to us, he 
engaged to pursue and exterminate those who 
had killed the persecutors of the heretics, and to 
reward with a mark of silver whoever should de- 
nounce, arrest, or cause to be arrested, a here 
tic ; to cause every house to be pulled down in 
which an asylum had been offered to one of the 
proscribed, or even where he might have found a 
burial ; to confiscate the goods of those who should 
have rendered them any kind office ; to destroy 
every lonely cottage, every grotto, every fast- 
ness, where they might find a refuge ; to take 
from the children of the heretics, and confiscate, 
whatever property they might have inherited from 
their parents ; to punish, by the confiscation of 
all their goods, and that without prejudice to cor- 
poral punishments, all those who, being called 
upon by the inquisitors to assist in the arrest of a 
heretic, should either refuse, or, by design, should 
suffer the accused to escape. In these same 
statutes, imposed upon count Raymond, numer- 
ons articles were added to the preceding to reach 
tliose who should endeavour by quitting their 
homes, or conveying their property by fictitious 
sales, or by other means, to escape from the ra- 
pacity of the officers. These articles agreed on 
at Melun were afterwards published at Toulouse 



A.D. 1234.] THE ALBIGENSES. 253 

on the 18th of February, 1234.* A council 
held at Beziers, in the same year, under the pre- 
sidency of the legate, added still more to this op- 
pression by pennitting any of the faithful to ar- 
rest every suspected person, in any place what- 
soever, upon an accusation of heresy, and by 
threatening with the heaviest penalties those 
who should in any way obstruct these private 
arrests, as soon as the word heresy was pronoun- 
ced.f 

The reader is, doubtless, wearied with the re- 
petition of the same decrees, the same menaces, 
and the same horrors ; but if we did not follow 
the persecutors in the annual renewal of their 
laws, and of their sanguinary acts, we should 
give a very false idea of the progress of power, 
and of the sufferings of the people. Heresy was 
not destroyed by those violent shocks, after which 
we may at least be permitted to enjoy the peace 
and silence of the tomb. These disastrous revo- 
lutions were succeeded by a protracted agony, 
but tranquility was never restored ; persecution 
was never suspended, even by the death of its- 
victims. The only expedient for maintaining the 
unity of the faith which the church had ever 
known, was to burn those w^ho separated from it. 
For two hundred years the fires had been kindled, 
yet every day catholics abandoned the faith of 
their fathers to embrace that which must conduct 
them to the flames. It was, in vain that Gregory 

*Statuta Raymondi comitis, in Concil. gener. Labbei, tcin. xj, n, 
443. ' 'V 

tStatuta Concilii Biterrensis, in Cone, gener. Labbei, torn, xi, p. 
452. > }i' 



254 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1235. 

IX had destroyed in 1231 all the heretics who 
had been concealed at Rome, and in the states of 
the church ; numerous letters addressed by him 
in 1235 to all the bishops of that part of Italy, 
announced, that notwithstanding the severity of 
the inquisitors, the Paterins had made fresh pro- 
gress.* A council was also held the same year 
in France, at Narbonne, where the archbishops of 
Narbonne, of Aries, and of Aix, presided, which 
addressed a circular to the inquisitors of the three 
provinces, declaring, likewise, that heresy had 
broken out afresh. f 

Amongst the twenty-nine articles of this circu- 
lar, which was to serve for instruction to the in- 
quisitors, there is none where the punishment of 
death is expressly pronounced, though in most of 
them it is understood by the hypocritical phrase 
of delivering the criminal to the secular arm. 
In fact, death was the invariable consequence of 
revolt or relapse, and the great business of the 
council of Narbonne, appears to have been (^ 10^ 
11, 12) to rauhiply the cases in which, by a fic- 
tion of law, they might apply the punishment of 
relapse or revolt. The forms of procedure pre- 
scribed by this circular are perhaps more import- 
ant than even the definition of the crimes. ' As 
to those you are to arrest,' say the prelates, ^ 
19, ' we think proper to add, that no man can be 
exempted from imprisonment, on account of his 
wife, however young she may be ; no woman, on 
account of her husband ; nor both of them on 
account of their children, their relations, or those 



*Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1235, § xv— xix, p. 467. 
fLabbei Concilia gener. torn. xi. p. 487. 



A.D. 1235.] THE ALBIGENSES. 255 

to whom they are most necessary. Let not any 
one be exempted from prison, on account of 

weakness, or age, or any similar cause If 

you have not succeeded in arresting them, hesi- 
tate not to proceed against the absent, as if they 
were present, <§> 22 ; take particular care, in con- 
formity with the discerning will of the apostolic 
see, not to publish by word or sign the names of 
the witnesses ; and if the culprit pretends, that 
he has enemies and that they have conspired 
against him, ask the names of those enemies, and 
the cause of that conspiracy, for thus you will 
provide for the safety of the witnesses, and the 
conviction of the accused. <5) 24. On account of 
the enormity of this crime, you ought to admit, 
in proof of it, the testimony of criminals, of in- 
famous persons, and of accomplices. <§> 26. He 
who persists in denying a fault, of which he may 
be convicted by witnesses, or by any other proof, 
must be considered, without hesitation, as an im- 
penitent heretic.'* 

Such favour shewn to informers, such precipi- 
tation in pronouncing the ruin of a family, struck 
with terror those who were the most attached to 
the catholic faith, and even those who had to 
reproach themselves with their share in the pre- 
ceding persecutions. The patience of the Lan- 
guedocians was exhausted ; the capitouls of Tou- 
louse, who formed the municipal magistracy, 
wished to oppose the continuance of these in- 
quests. They could no longer bear the specta- 
cle daily presented to them by the inquisitors, of 

*Labbei Concil. gen. torn, xi, p. 488 — 501. 



256 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1236. 

digging up the half-putrified bodies of those 
against whom informations had been laid, and af- 
ter the mockery of a trial, dragging them on a 
hurdle to the flames, through all the streets of 
the city. The capitouls expelled from the city 
the chaplains of the parochial churches, who had 
been employed by the inquisitors in citing wit- 
nesses, and they prohibited the latter from ap- 
pearing or deposing in future.* The friar, Wil- 
liam Arnold, grand inquisitor, would not recog- 
nize the authority of the magistracy, and he took 
his departure on the 5th of November, 1235. 
The next day the forty jacobin monks, who were 
in the convent of St. Dominic, quitted the city 
in procession. On the 10th of the same month, 
excommunication was pronounced against Tou- 
louse, and Raymond VII, who happened then to 
be with Frederic II in Alsace, was, nevertheless, 
included in the same sentence,! although he hast- 
ened to make his submission, and recal the in- 
quisitors. It was not till the end of the year 
1236 that he could obtain his absolution; and 
Gregory IX charged it as a crime against the 
emperor, that he had communicated with this 
count, in spite of the sentence that had been 
passed upon him.."!; 

In France, as well as throughout the rest of 
Europe, in the middle age, wherever great cities 
were found, there was also a principle of liberty ; 
whenever these great cities were adjacent, and 

♦Martene Thesaurus Anecdot. torn, i, p. 992. 
t Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxiv, ch. y. p. 404. 
^Hist. de Languedoc, liv; xxiv, ch. viii. p. 4Q7<, Raynaldi 
Ann. Eccles. 1236. § xxxix— xlv, p. 484. 



A.D. 1238.] THE ALBIGENSES. 257 

could combine their efforts, there was a principle 
of political power for the people. The early 
multiplication of cities, in certain regions, is a fact 
which it is not always easy to explain. The 
first rays of history, in the middle age, discover 
to us a population, numerous and united in cer- 
tain provinces, and thin and scattered in others. 
Whether these cities had been preserved from 
the early times of the Roman empire, or whether 
the richaess of the soil, commerce, and a wiser 
government, had enabled them to repair their 
losses, we cannot determine. Next to Italy, Prov- 
ence and Languedoc displayed the richest and most 
populous cities. The war against the Albigenses 
had not been able to destroy this superiority in 
riches and population. The spirit of the com- 
munes, which was fermenting in all the cities of 
France, assumed a more repubhcan character in 
these provinces. 

The south of France, which, by the riches of 
its cities, and the spirit of its inhabitants, present- 
ed at that time the image of Italy, was, besides, 
not uniformly submitted to the same monarchy. 
The immediate authority of Louis IX only ex- 
tended over the two districts of Beaucaire and 
Carcassonne. Provence held from the empire ; 
Aquitaine belonged to the king of England; 
Montpellier, Perpignan, and some neighbouring 
lordships, to the king of Aragon ; and a part of 
Languedoc to the count of Toulouse. These 
were, it is true, all three vassals of the crown of 
France ; but vassals so powerful, that the will of 
the king was not even consulted, about extending 
or restraining the privileges of the citizens. No- 
16 



258 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1236. 

thing indicates to us that Louis IX had occupied 
himself with the repubhcan fermentation, in the 
cities of the south. On the contrary, it was more 
connected with the pohcy of the emperor Frede- 
ric II, who, at this period attracted, much more 
than the young king of France, the attention of 
all Europe ; and the revolutions which w^ere now 
preparing in Italy, must also have had an influ- 
ence upon all the cities of the Provencal lan- 
guage. 

Frederic II and Gregory IX, too proud and 
too ambitious to divide their power between them, 
had given way afresh to mutual animosities. New 
subjects of dispute seemed every day to arise, 
and every day their correspondence became more 
bitter, and their mutual recriminations announced 
an approaching explosion. They were, never- 
theless, still at peace, though each suspected the 
other as the secret ally of all his enemies. Each, 
in fact, nourished the popular passions in the 
states of his rival ; not from a desire of favouring 
justice or liberty, the rights or the happiness of 
the people, but only in order to embarrass and 
weaken him, whom at present he dared not call 
his enemy. Frederic excited Pieto Frangipani 
to stir up the Romans against the governm.ent of 
the pope, and to name independent magistrates,* 
whilst Gregory IX corresponded with the citizens 
of Milan, who had renewed the siege of Lom- 
bardy, and still kept the field against the empe- 
ror.f Frederic II took under his protection the 

*Richardi de Sancto Germano, torn, vii, 1037. Raynaldi 
Ann. Eccles. 1237, § xiii— xv, f. 494. 
t Raynaldi Ann. Eccles. 1237, § i— xii, p. 493. 



A.D. 1236.] THE ALBIGENSES. 259 

republics, or the imperial cities In Provence, 
which had declared themselves free, because Ray- 
mond Berenger, count of Provence, and father- 
m-law of Saint Louis, had shewn himself zedous 
in the cause of the church. Although the king- 
dom of Aries held from the empire, Frederic II 
well knew that he should derive no advantage 
from this pretended sovereignty. Far from feel- 
ing any jealousy at the extension which the cities 
of Marseilles and Avignon sought to give to their 
privileges, he knew that by declaring himself 
their protector, against their direct lord, he should 
attach them so much the more to himself, as he 
should render them more free, and that the oc- 
cupation which he should thereby give to Ray- 
mond Berenger, would prevent him from assist-* 
ing the pope in Lombardy.* 

Of the four republics of Provence, that of Nice 
had already fallen. It had been reduced on the 
9th of November, 1229, in spite of aH the aid 
afforded by the republic of Genoa, to open its 
gates to Raymond Berenger, and acknowledge 
him as absolute sovereign. The repubhc of Aries, 
which the count of Provence next attacked, re-. 
sisted till 1239, when it was also compelled to 
submission. But the two cities of Avignon and 
Marseilles displayed more vigour. They collect- 
ed forces, repulsed the soldiers of the count of 
Provence, and bestowed the command of their 
troops, with prerogatives rather honorary than 
real, upon Raymond VII, count of Toulouse, 
who was so much the dearer to them, because 



* Rayaaldi Ann. Eccles. 1237, § xxxiv, xxxvii^ p, 497, 



260 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1236. 

they saw him exposed to the animosity of the 
prelates.'* 

But the repubhcan spirit not only manifested 
itself in the towns of Provence, it equally ani- 
mated the counsels of all the cities of the South. 
We have seen it exhibited at Toulouse in the 
resistance made by the capitouls to the inquisi- 
tors. It had been displayed in the cities sub- 
mitted to the domain of king Louis, in Narbonne 
and Nismes, as well as at Montpelher and Per- 
pignan, which held from the king of Aragon,and 
at Bayonne and Bourdeaux, which depended on 
the king of England. A letter written about this 
time, by the consuls of the town of Narbonne, to 
the consuls of Nismes, shews us that both those 
cities, though dependant on the king of France, 
called themselves republics; that the spirit of 
liberty in all the cities equally revolted against 
religious tyranny and civil despotism ; and, that 
the neio-hbourino- cities exerted their ofForts to 
form a coalition, and to combine their resistance. 

'To the venerable and discreet consuls of 
Nismes, the consuls of .the town of Narbonne, 
health. May the administration of your repub- 
lic \)e just, both as to temporals and spirituals. 
We desire to make known to your discretion the 
dissension which has happened between us and the 
archbishop of Narbonne, as well as some of the 
preaching brethren, by whom our community is 
enormously oppressed, though it is ready to obey 
the right, and hear devoutly the orders of the 



* Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xviii, p. 412. Bouche, Hist* 
de Provence, torn, ii, 239. 



A.D. 1236.] THE ALBIGENSES. 261 

church. And as, according to your eqmty, you 
ought to have compassion on those that are un- 
justly oppressed, and to obviate the ills which 
they suffer, we supplicate your prudence, in 
which we have entire confidence, not to fear, 
through fatigue, to listen to our entire relation of 
facts, since it cannot be abridged. (We feel 
ourselves, however, obliged to suppress a part.) 
As we have said, although we are ready to con- 
form to right in every thing, our archbishop, who 
wishes to destroy our consulate, has involved us 
in a sentence of excommunication, with all our 
counsellors, all who pay the tribute which we 
levy for the government of our republic, with all 
the collectors. He has also submitted to a gen- 
eral interdict our whole university, our wives, and 
our children. As the height of severity, he has 
forbidden under pain of anathema to all our no- 
taries, who hold any public office, to perform any 
act for any member of the community. He has 
prohibited to the physicians the practice of medi- 
cine, and to the priests to admit any one to com- 
munion and penitence, unless it be in the article 
of death, and also by paying eight livres and a 
denier to be released from that sentence.' 

The consuls of Narbonne afterwards relate, 
with long details, the causes and circumstances 
of their quarrel with the archbishop, and the vex- 
ations they endure on the part of the inquisitors. 
They affirm that these, despising all the rules of 
justice, thought of nothing but to get possession 
of the property of the rich, even when they were 
exposed to no suspicion of heresy. They add, 
that when the inquisitors had plundered them, 



262 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1236. 

sometimes they dismissed them without trial, and 
sometimes they caused them to perish in prison, 
without pronouncing an^ sentence upon them. 
They then proceed to give examples of the in- 
terrogatories of the inquisitors, to which it was 
impossible to reply without being convicted of 
heresy. The greater part of these questions are 
as improper to be repeated, as they were incapa- 
ble of being answered, being frivolous, captious, 
and indecent ; but they afterwards passed to oth- 
ers of a somewhat different kind. ' They de- 
manded of these simple laics, if the host which 
the priest consecrated contains all the body of Je- 
sus Christ ? If the laic answers that it contains 
the entire body of Jesus Christ, the inquisitor 
directly rephes : You beheve then that when 
four priests, who are in one church, consecrate 
each of them a host, as they ought to do, each 
of these hosts contains the body of Jesus Christ ? 
If the laic rephes that he believes so. You think 
then, replies the inquisitor, that there are four 
Gods ? Then the afirighted laic affirms the con- 
trary.'* 

This letter, which was written about the year 
1234, appears rather destined to be a protest, or 
an appeal to public opinion, than a demand of 
effective succour. The distance between the 
cities of southern France was too great to allow 
of the one marching its militia to the assistance 
of the others. Neither do we know what reply 
the citizens of Nismes addressed to those of INar- 



* Hist, de la ville de Nimes, torn, i, liv. iii, p. 307. Preuves, 
No. liii, p. 73. 



A.D. 1240.] THE ALBIGENSES. 263 

bonne. Perhaps this letter gave occasion to a more 
close alliance ; perhaps an association of the cities 
began to be formed in the provinces of the Pro- 
vencal language ; and as, by following the ex- 
ample of the league of Lombardy, it might pro- 
ceed to acquire greater consistency, perhaps it 
occasioned some apprehension to Gregory IX ; 
perhaps he feared, above all, the alliance which 
he saw ready to be formed between several of 
these cities, the count of Toulouse, and the em- 
peror Frederic II. At least, and without our 
being able to explain the reason, an order of the 
court of Rome was^ in 1237, addressed to the 
inquisitors of Languedoc, to intimate to them, 
that they should suspend all inquiry after the 
heretics ; and, in fact, throughout this province, 
from the year 1237 to the year 1241, the inquis- 
ition remained in a state of total inactivity.* 

1240. To the agitation which, during that pe- 
riod, was excited throughout all France, by a 
double crusade against the Greeks at Constanti- 
nople, and the Mussulmans at Jerusalem, a state 
of langour and discouragement succeeded, when 
the ill success, by which both had been attended, 
became fully known. The great lords, who re- 
turned from these two expeditions, entered quiet- 
ly into their states, with few soldiers, few equi 
pages, and no money ; ashamed of their failure, 
of their precipitate return, and of the condition 
in which they had left their companions in arms. 
The most powerful of them disappeared, for some 

♦ Guill. de Podio Laureiitii, ch. xliii, p^69^. Hist, de Lan- 
guedoc, t. iii, liv. XXV, ch. xiv et xv, p, 411. 



264 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1240. 

time, from the scene, and seemed to wait quietly 
till their reverses were forgotten, whilst, in the 
period which immediately followed their return, 
history is occupied only with the lords who had 
taken no part in these expeditions. 

Amongst these, Raymond VII, count of Tou- 
louse, was still one of the most powerful. He 
began to revive after his long sufferings. The 
proceedings of the inquisition had been, for a 
time, suspended in his conntry, and he endeav- 
oured to profit by the repose which he enjoyed, 
and by the reverses which his enemies had expe- 
rienced, to recover, in part, that consideration 
which he had lost by the disastrous treaty of 
Paris. In this hope, he cultivated the friendship 
of Frederic 11, who appeared, at that time, suffi- 
ciently powerful to protect him against his ene- 
mies, the priests. During his misfortunes, Ray- 
mond VII had always found his neighbour, Ray- 
mond Berenger, count of Provence, ready, for his 
own advantage, still more to aggravate them. 
This count had embraced the part of the church 
against Frederic II, and the emperor, by a sen- 
tence pronounced at Cremona, in the month of 
December, 1239, had put Raymond Berenger 
IV to the ban of the empire, and had granted 
his coantship of Forcalquier to the count of Tou- 
louse. Raymond VII, in consequence, in the 
month of January, 1240, assembled his army on 
the borders of the Rhone to attack the Proven- 
gals.* 

Raymond soon took possession of a number of 

* Hist, de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxii, p. 419. 



A.D. 1229.] THE ALBIGENSES. 265 

small places in Provence, and amongst others, of 
the castle of Trinquetaille, in the island of Cam- 
argue, opposite to Aries. He afterwards under- 
took the siege of that great city, which Raymond 
Berenger had coitipelled to submit to himself. 
The Marseillois, who saw, in the subjugation of 
that neighbouring republic, the fate with which 
they themselves were menaced, ardently desired 
to restore Aries to liberty, and seconded the at- 
tempts of Raymond with all their power. The 
citizens of Aries, in the mean time, joined them- 
selves to the garrison of the count who defended 
their walls, that they might not remain exposed 
to the horrors which were always reserved for the 
vanquished. The resistance was prolonged dur- 
ing great part of the summer, and the count of 
Toulouse was at last obliged to raise the siege. =^ 
He then returned by the countship of Venaissin, 
and remained sometime at Avignon, to establish 
peace in that republic, where troubles had arisen 
on account of the election of the podestat.f 

Several knights of the district of Carcassonne, 
subjects consequently of the king of France, took 
upon themselves to testify their zeal against the 
count of Toulouse, by going to the assistance of 
the count of Provence, but, falling into an ambus- 
cade, they were put to the rout. Raymond, how- 
ever, recognizing them as French subjects, thought 
only of appeasing the anger which the king might 
feel at the action. He immediately wrote to the 
king, expressing his desire to remain at peace 

* Guill. de Podio Latir. ch , xliii, p. 695. Hist, de LanguedoCj 
liv. XXV, ch. xxxiv,p. 419. 

t Acle du ii Aout 1240. Preuves de Languedoc, p. 394. 



266 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1240. 

with France, and throwing the blame of the defeat 
they had received, upon their own imprudence. 
On the other side, Henry III, king of Eng- 
land, had written to Frederic II, to recommend 
to his clemency the count of Provence, his father- 
in-law,* and, as he received from the emperor a 
favourable reply, it appeared that peace was about 
to be established upon the borders of the Rhone, 
when all at once,young Trencavel, son of that Ray- 
mond Roger, viscount of Beziers and of Carcas- 
sonne, whom Simon de Montfort had, in 1209, 
caused to perish in his prisons, appeared in the 
country to claim the heritage of his fathers. H& 
was accompanied by Olivier de Termes, Jourdain 
de Saissac, and a great number of other knights, 
w4io had been proscribed under suspicion of her- 
esy, and had afterwards distinguished themselves 
in Aragon and Valencia in the war against the 
Moors. Their memory was still dear to their an- 
cient vassals ; and they were especially preferred 
to the new masters, whose yoke the people had 
ever since been obliged to support. At their ar- 
rival, therefore, the whole country rose in their 
cause. In this moment of danger, the archbishop 
of Narbonne and the bishop of Toulouse shut 
themselves up in Carcassonne, to confirm the 
chizens in their fidelity to the king of France. 
They expected to have made sure of them, by 
causing them to renew their oaths ; the inhabi- 
tants of the town of Carcassonne however rose in 
the night of the 18th of September, after celebra- 

* Matth. Paris. Hist. Anglite, p. 473. 



A.D. 1240.] THE ALBIGENSES. 267 

ting the feast of the nativity of the virgin, and re- 
ceived Trencavel within their walls.* 

Louis IX, early informed of the approach of 
those ancient exiles, took active measures to ar- 
rest a revolt which appeared to him. as much di- 
rected against heaven as against himself. He dis- 
patched into Languedoc his chamberlain, John 
de Beaumont, with many other knights, to collect 
an army with all expedition. Trencavel, appris- 
ed of the approach of the French, and not having 
been able during a month that he had occupied 
the suburbs of Carcassonne to obtain possession 
ofthe city, felt that he could not maintain himself 
there, and abandoned it on the 11th of Septem- 
ber, to shut himself up in Montreal. He sustain- 
ed there a long siege, and when at last he w^as 
forced to surrender the place to John de Beau- 
mont, it was by an honourable capitulation, which 
permitted him to retire into Catalonia with all his 
knights.f But on the other hand, the inhabitants, 
and all those who not being gentlemen were 
judged unworthy of being included in the capitu- 
lation, were treated by John de Beaumont with 
that rigour in. which the fanatics glory, when they 
imagine themselves called upon to avenge the 
cause of God. Nangis gives us no details ; he 
only says of the king's heutenant, ' We may with 
truth apply to him the words of Scripture, Inhis 
wrath he stamped the earth with his feet, and the 

* Hist, gen de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxviii, p. 421. ChroQ. 
de Saint Denys. p. 57. 

t Hist. gen. de Languedoc, liv. xxv, ch. xxxix, p. 422. 



268 CRUSADES AGAINST [a,D. 1241. 

nations tvere dumb with astonishment y at behold- 
ing his furyJ^ 

During the expedition of Trencavel, Raymond 
count of Toulouse had remained in suspense res- 
pecting the part he ought to take ; but when he saw 
that lord again obliged to quit the country, his par- 
tisans given up to punishment, the French flock- 
ing to range themselves under the royal standards, 
and Louis IX employing all his activity to arrest 
the rebellion, he was afraid of seeing the crusades 
against Albigeois renewed in all their fury, and 
resolved upon disarming the church and the 
French by an entire submission. He treated first 
with the cardinal legate, James bishop of Prenes- 
tum. He engaged, before the 1st of March, 
1241, to abandon the cause of the emperor, who 
had been again excommunicated by Gregory IX, 
and who was endeavouring to avenge himself 
upon the weakest cities of the states of the 
church. Raymond even premised to assist with 
all his power, the Roman church against Freder- 
ic II who called himself emperor, and against all 
who supported his pretended rights. f Raymond 
afterwards set cut for the court of France, and 
having found Louis IX atMontargis, sw^ore tohim 
on the 14th of March to assist him ' towards and 
against all,' to drive from his country the /oy^f^^, 
or those who had been proscribed on account of 
their faith, and to assist the king in destroying 
them in that part of Languedoc which belonged 

* Gesta Ludovici IX, p. 334. Prasclara Francor. facinora, p. 
778, 779. Guill. liuiart, Branche aux royaux lignages, p. 135. 

t Hist, de Langued. liv. xxv, c. xli, p. 423. Preuves, no- 
ccxxxiv , p. E99. 



A.D. 1242.] THE ALBIGENSES. 269 

to him. Raymond, on his return to Toulouse, 
made peace also with Raymond Berenger count 
of Provence, and, on the 18th of April, at Lunel, 
signed a treaty with the kingof Aragon.* 

1242. Raymond VII made still one more 
struggle to free himself and his country, before 
the chains of slavery were finally and irrevocably 
riveted upon him. He took advantage of the war 
between England and the French barons, and 
Louis IX, to form a league with the kings of 
Spain, who possessed fiefs in France, and the 
great lords of the Provencal language. Although 
abandoned in the moment of trial by the greater 
part of his allies, he, in the month of April, 1242, 
held an assembly of the lords at the foot of the 
Pyrenees, who were for the greater part his vas- 
sals, and who agreed in cono^rt with him to de- 
clare war against France. Roger count of Foix 
was the first who promised to second him with all 
his forces ; the counts of Armagnac, of Comin- 
ges, and of Rhodoz, and a great number of vis- 
counts and lords made similar engagements with 
him. 

About the middle of June, the combined army 
of the Languedocians entered the provinces which 
Raymond VII had ceded to Louis IX, by the 
treaty of Paris. In a short time they conquered 
the greater part of Rasez, of Minervois of Nar- 
bonnois, and of Termenois. Raymond was in- 
troduced into Narbonne by the viscount of that 
city, but the archbishop fled at his approach, and, 
on his arrival at Beziers, fulminated against him, 

*Hist. de Langued. liv. xxv, c. xli, p. 423. Preuves, no. 
ecxxxiv, p. 400. 



'210 CRUSADES AGAINST [a.D. 1242. 

on the 21st of July, a sentence of excommunica- 
tion. The inhabitants of the country, seeing 
their lord engaged in a war with those same 
Frenchmen, who had been the agents of all the 
persecutions of the church, and had delivered 
them up to the merciless tribunal of the faith, 
thought the moment arrived to„^free themselves 
from the insupportable tyranny of the inquisitors. 
Some Albigensian heretics, who had taken refuge 
in the castle of Mirepoix, set out in the night of 
the 28th of May, and surprised the castle of Avig- 
nonet where Wilham Arnold had lately establish- 
ed the supreme tribunal of the inquisition. Four 
Dominicans, two Franciscans, and seven Nuncios 
or familiars of the inquisition, of whom this tribu- 
nal was composed, were cut in pieces. These 
monks, who had ordered so many murders, who 
had been insensible to the sorrows of so many 
families, awaited their murderers on their knees 
and singing Te Deiim, without endeavoring either 
to defend or save themselves. They already an- 
ticipated the enjoyment of the glory of the mar- 
tyrs, so sincerely did they imagine themselves 
serving God when they bathed his altars with the 
blood of human victims.* 

The inactivity of the kings of Spain, the suc- 
cess of Louis in the lower Poitou, the defection 
of the count of Marche, and the lords of Aqui- 
taine, and the flight of Henry III, were enough 
to abate the courage of Raymond VII. Never- 
theless, no army at present menaced his count- 
ship of Toulouse, and he wished to judge of the 

* Extraicts des Procedures de I'lnquisition, touchant le meurtre 
des Inquisiteurs. Preuves, n o. cclxiv, p. 438. 



A.D. 1242.] THE ALBIGENSES. 271 

State in which his ally, the king of England, was 
placed. He came, therefure, to meet him at 
Bourdeaux, where he signed the treaty of the 
28th of August, by which their alliance was con- 
firmed, and both engaged not to treat separately 
with the king of France.* But, whoever had 
seen the king o£ England near, could have no 
confidence in him, or in any league of which he 
was the chief. Raymond soon perceived that all 
his allies were turning against him. Louis had 
given orders to the count of Marche, to expiate 
his rebellion by attacking the count of Toulouse. 
He had joined with him, however, as an inspect- 
or, Mauclerc, the ancient duke of Britanny. 
Raymond soon after received a letter from the 
count of Foix, the ally upon whom he reckoned 
the most, which announced that being no longer 
willing to persevere in a desperate cause, he with- 
drew his homage, and that he had treated with 
the king, who had taken him under his immediate 
protection.f Whatever resentment Raymond 
might testify at this defection, there is reason to 
suspect that he had, at this very time, despatched 
the bishop of Toulouse to the king, to treat for 
his own submission. The conditions which this 
prelate demanded not having been acceded to, 
Raymond VH wrote, on the 20th of October, to 
Saint Louis, submitting to him unconditionally, 
and demanding mercy for himself and his asso- 
ciates, with the exception of the heretics, upon 

* Rymer Acta, t. i, p. 410, 411. 

f Hist, de Languedoc, t, iii, liv. xxv, c. 62, p. 435. Guill. de 
Podio Laur. ch. xiv, p. 698. P. de Marca, Hist, de Beam, liv. 
viii, ch. xxiii, p. 763. 



272 CRUSADES [a.d. 1243. 

whom he promised to execute severe justice, as 
well as upon those who had killed the inquisi- 
tors.* 

Louis, who had sent a fresh body of troops 
against Raymond, under the orders of the bishop 
of Clermont and Imbert de Beacijeu, and who 
had demanded of an assembly of the Gallican 
church, held at Paris, a twentieth of the ecclesi- 
astical revenues, to defray the expense of a new 
crusade against the Albigenses,f suffered himself 
nevertheless to be moved by the solicitations of 
Raymond ; and so much the more, as they were 
powerfully recommend by queen Blanche, cousin 
of the count of Toulouse. Commissaries from 
the king met Raymond in Lauraguais, the 22nd 
of December, 1242, and agreed with him that 
the treaty of Paris should be restored in its full 
extent. Soon after, Raymond set out forLorris, 
in Gatinois, where the king had appointed to meet 
him. He renewed his homage to him in the 
month of January, 1243, and peace was thus re- 
stored to all that part of France where the Pro- 
vengal language was spoken. J 

* Hist, de Languedoc, 1. xxv, c. Ixiv, p. 436. Preuves, n. 
251, p. 415. 

tMatth. Paris, p. 527. 

:}: Hist, de Languedoc, 1. xxv, c. Ixv, Ixvi, p. 437. Bernard! 
Guidonis vita Caelegtiai IV, Scr. Rer. Ital. t. iii, p. 589. 



APPENDIX. 



Account of the Waldenses and Atbigemes : from Venema^s 
Historia Ecclesiastica, t. vi, § 115 — 126. 



Concerning the Waldenses we may consult amongst 
the ancient writers,* although their bitterest enemies : 
1. Bernard, Abbot of Clair-Vaux of the Pragmonstra- 
tensian order, a writer of this age, who exhibits the 
heads of the disputations between Bernard, the arch- 
bishop of Narbonne. and the Waldenses, in the year 
1195. Gretzer edited, together with Ebrard a Fleming, 
and Ermengard, hoth unknown authors, a work against 
the Waldenses, which is contained in the 24th vol. of 
the Bibliotheca Patrum, but from which little can be 
learned. 2. i^emter, a monk of Placentia ; first a leader 
of the sect, but who having deserted them was attached 
to the class of preachers, and became inquisitor-general 
in the 13th century. There is still extant a book of his 
against the Waldenses. Reinier's prolix account of the 
sentiments of the Waldenses, was recited 300 years af- 
ter, in the catalogue of the witnesses of the truth, book 
XV, where also are exhibited other things pertaining to 
this subject from the history of Bohemia by Jj^neas'Sil- 
vias, and from the collections concerning the city of 
Toulouse by James de Riberea.f 3. Peter PUichdorf 
in the 15th century, who wrote against the errors of the 
Waldenses, and against the ;?oor men q/'i3/07?5. 4. The 
book of the judgments of the inquisition at Toulouse, 

* These were edited by Gretzer, and published in the Bibl. 
Patrum . 

fThe work of Reinier was more fully edited by Gretzer, and 
republished in the 25th volume of the Biblioth. Patrum. 

17 



274 APPENDIX. 

published by Limborch, in his history of the inquisition. 
But besides these documents transmitted by their adver- 
saries, there are others to be compared with them, and 
much more worthy of credit, from the Waldenses them- 
selves ; and also confessions, catechisms, dialogues, and 
other tracts in Leger's history of the Waldenses, book 
i : to which may be added the confessions both of the 
Waldenses and Albigenses,^given by Flacius Illyricus 
in the 15th vol. of the Catalogus tesiium veritatis, — by 
the Centuriatores Magdeburgenses, centur. xii, — by B. 
Pictetus, in the continviation of Suerus Sec. ii, who re- 
cites the most ancient of all, composed in the year 1100. 
Bossuet indeed, in his History of the Variations, &c., 
contends that these monuments are not genuine ; but 
they are vindicated by Leger, and by Basnage in his 
Hist. Eccl. tom. ii.f Their antiquitity is also confirmed 
by the language, and the, immemorial tradition of the 
Waldenses, though it must be confessed that they are 
not all equal in that respect. Of the modern writers, 
besides Leger, Perrin, and Peter Gillis, amongst the 
Protestants are to be consulted Usher de successione 
Ecclesise &c. and Limborch in the history of the inquis- 
ition, 1. i, c. 8. And, amongst the Eoman Catholics, 
Thuanus Hist. 1. v, a. 1550, Bossuet Histoire des varia- 
tions &c.,Natalis Alexander, Hist. Eccles. hujus seculi, 
and others. 

They bore various names, some derived from their 
teachers, some from their manner of life, some from the 
places where they dwelt, some from the fate they suffer- 
ed, and some from the good pleasure of their neigh- 
bours : all these it would be too long and tedious to re- 
capitulate. That I may just notice that of Waldenses, 
and some others by which they are principally known, I 
will, however, observe that they are considered to have 
been called so from Peter Valdo, or \Valdo, who is said 
to be either the founder or the principal promoter of the 
sect. Waldo was a citizen and rich merchant of Lyons 
who flourished in the middle of the 12th century about 
the year 1160. Whilst several of the principal citizens 
among whom was Waldo, were conversing together, 

t [See Note on p. 279 by the American Editor.] 



APPENDIX. 275 

and one of them was struck with death before then* eyes, 
he is said to have been so impressed Avith a sense of 
human frailty and of the divine wrath, that he renounced 
the world from that moment and gave himself up entire- 
ly to meditation upon the word of God, and to the pro- 
pagation of piety. He first began with his own family, 
and then as his fame increased, admitted and instructed 
others, and also translated the Scriptures into the ver- 
nacular language of Gaul. That he was not destitute 
of erudition, as some maintain, Flacius Illyricus asserts 
from evidence derived from ancient writings. The cler- 
gy of Lyons, when these proceedings came to their 
knowledge, opposed, and prohibited his domestic instruc- 
tions ; but so far was this from proving an obstacle, that 
be inquired the more diligently into the opinions of the 
clergy, and into religious rites and customs, and opposed 
them the more openly and ardently. Since he taught 
for four or five years at Lyons, and made many disciples, 
some think they were from him called Waldenses ; but 
others suppose that the name was derived from Christ- 
ians of his sect, who had from ancient times inhabited 
the vallies of Piedmont. The vallies are called Vaux, 
whence Vaudois ; and Peter is said to have borne the 
name of Waldo because he was a follower of that sect. 
That the name was used before his time appears from 
this, that it is found in a confession brought to light by 
Pictetus. The other names, either proper to them, or 
common to them with the Albigenses, are principally the 
following: Leonistse, or poor men of Lyons; this was 
given them from the place where they arose, and from 
the life of poverty which, in the beginning from their 
dependence on charity and various vexations, they were 
obliged to lead. As to what respects the name of Sab- 
bataiorum, this came from their wooden shoes, which in 
the Gallic tongue were called Sahots.* They are con- 
sidered to have been called Patarini, on account of their 
sufferings, but more justly because they were esteemed 
heretics ; and in a former century the Mediolani were 
so called who urged the celibacy of the clergy, from 
whom it was transferred to any other heretics. The 

* See Du Can^e Gloss. Lat. Medii aevi in voce. 



276 APPENDIX. 

same sort of derivation may be given to the epithet Ca- 
thari ; but those of Picards, Lombards, Bohemians, Bul- 
garians, Albigenses, were given from the countries in 
which they dwelt. Finally they were principally called 
Turpelini or Turelupini in Flanders and Artois, because 
of the many miseries to which they were exposed, ac- 
cording to a proverb used in that country, by which chil- 
dren whose fate was unfortunate, were called Turelupins 
from one Turelupin the father of some children who 
perished miserably.* But it may be well to consult 
Mosheim, who, in his history of the 13th century, con- 
tends that the Turlupini were the same as the brethren of 
the free spirit, fanatics and mystics, and imbued with the 
errors of the Pantheists. 

I shall enumerate, from the monuments above cited, 
the chief articles of this heresy, before I shew its origin 
and fate ; they were the following : 1. That the holy 
Scriptures are the only source of faith and religion, with- 
out regard to the authority of the Fathers and of tradi- 
tion ; and although they principally used the New Test- 
ament, yet as Usher proves from Reinier and others, they 
regarded the Old also as canonical Scripture. From 
their greater use of the New Testament however their 
adversaries took occasion to charge them with despising 
the Old. 2. They held the entire faith, according to all 
the articles of the apostles' creed. 3. They rejected 
all the external rites of the dominant church, excepting 
baptism and the Lord's supper, as temples, vestures, im^ 
ages, crosses, the religious worship of the holy relics, 
and the remaining sacraments ; these they considered as 
inventions of Satan and of the flesh, and full of super- 
stition. 4. They rejected purgatory, with masses and 
prayers for the dead, acknowledging only two termina- 
tions of the present state, heaven and hell. 5. They 
admitted no indulgences nor confessions of sin with any 
of their consequences, excepting mutual confessions of 
the faithful for instruction and consolation. 6. They 
held the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist only 
as signs, denying the corporal presence of Christ in the 
eucharist ; as we find in the book of this sect concerning 

* Vide Beausobre de Adamiiis p. 2. 



APPENDIX. 277 

antichrist, and as Ebrard de Bethunia accuses them in 
his book antihcBresios. 7. They held only three ecclesi- 
astical orders, bishops, priests, and deacons, and that the 
remainder were human figments ; that monasticism was 
a putrid carcase, and vows the inventions of men ; and 
that the marriage of the clergy was lawful and necessa- 
ry. According to Reinier they had three or four orders. 
First the bishop, who had under him two presbyters, one 
the elder son, the -other the younger, who visited the 
faithful submitted to the bishop, and one deacon. 8. Fin- 
ally they asserted the Roman church to be the whore of 
Babylon, and denied obedience to the pope or bishops 
and that the pope had any authority over other churches, 
or the power of either the civil or ecclesiastical sword. 

Besides these articles, others are attributed to them, 
though not without controversy, since by some they are 
denied. 1. Reinier and the inquisition of Toulouse re- 
late, that they reprobated judges and magistrates with 
all judgments against criminals ; but that this can refer 
only to capital punishments, is clear from the testimonies 
themselves. Besides, their ancient confessions of faith 
testify that they did not deny obedience to magistrates. 
But as in Perrin's Light and Treasure of Faih they do 
not absolutely condemn capital punishments, it is doubt- 
ful how long they had condemned them, and whether 
this was the opinion of all the Waldenses, or at all times. 
2. Nor, as is imputed to them, did they reject infant-bap- 
tism, but only held it a thing not necessary, as appears 
from Reinier himself, who only charges them with hold- 
ing that the baptism of infants was useless. It appears 
also from their Spiritual Calendar, that infants were by 
them washed in the sacred font. But as their pastors 
were frequently absent, they rather chose to omit bap- 
tism than to commit their children to the priests, esteem- 
ing psedobaptism not of so much necessity ; whence 
might easily arise the suspicion that they rejected the 
baptism of infants. 3. Reinier asserts that they refused 
to take even lawful oaths, but he adds that this properly 
relates only to the perfect, who rather chose death than 
to take an oath ; to the others therefore swearing was not 
prohibited. The Waldenses also testify in their 
Spiritual Calendar, that oaths were esteemed lawful 
amongst them. 



278 APPENDIX. 

In relating' the rise and progress of this sect, regard 
must be had to the singular testimony of Reinier, in 
which he affirms this sect to be more pernicious than all 
the rest, for three reasons. 1. Because it is more an- 
cient and of longer standing ; adding, that some have 
traced it to the time of Silvester in the 4th century, and 
others to the times of the apostles. Reinier in summing 
up, towards the end of his work, gives it as their opin- 
ion, 'that the church of Christ,' these are his oAvn words, 
'remained with the bishops and other prelates until B. 
Silvester, and then fell off until they restored it : how- 
ever they atrirm that there were always some who feared 
God and were saved.' 2. Because it is more general ; 
'For indeed,' says he, 'there is scarcely any country 
where this sect is not found.' 3. Because it has a pure 
faith in God, and in the articles of th% creed, and a great 
appearance of piety. This testimony proceeding from 
their adversary, who lived not far from their times, in 
the middle of the 13th century, is agreeable to truth, 
and worthy of observation. Some of the pontiffs have 
accused them of various lusts, and other crimes, but this 
has been done merely from calumny, and according to 
their accustomed method of charging those who with- 
draw from their communion with licentiousness as the 
cause of that separation ; and this the more foolishly, 
because as every kind of licentiousness abounded in the 
pontifical society, there was not the least cause for with- 
drawing on this account. Neither the inquisition of 
Toulouse, nor Reinier have any charges of this kind 
against the Waldenses, but, as we have seen, quite the 
contrary. The anonymous author, who wrote a treatise 
concerning the heresy of the poor of Lyons,* openly 
says, ' as to what is affirmed of them, that they kiss cats 
and rats, and see the devil ; or that having extinguished 
the lights, they commit promiscuous fornication ; I do 
not think it belongs to this sect, because the Cathari are 
said to do this, nor have 1 learned any of these things in 
such a way as that I could believe them.' That the tes- 
timony given respecting their antiquity and increase, is 
perfectly just, will appear from the history of their rise 
and progress which T am about to relate. 

* See Martinet! Thesaurum Novum, vol. 5. 



APPENDIX. 279 

Concerning the antiquity of this sect, although the 
testimony of Reinieris sufficient of itself, there are not 
wanting other documents. That there were persons of 
this sect before the time of Waldo, is clear from the an- 
cient treatise concerning Antichrist against the Roman- 
ists, an. 11.20, published by Perrin, in his history of the 
Waldenses ; and also from an epistle of a certain pro- 
vost, named Steneld, to Bernard, written before the death 
of Waldo, a fragment of which is exhibited by Usher 
from Driedo ; where it is related, amongst other things, 
that some of these men were seized by the excessive 
zeal of the populace, and thrown into, the fire, and that 
they bore the torment not only with patience but joy. 
They are also described as persons ' who do not trust in 
the intercessions of the dead, or the prayers of the saints, 
and who maintain that fasts and other afflictions which 
are practised on account of sin, are not necessary for the 
righteous ; and who do not allow the fire of purgatory 
after death ; nor believe that the body of Christ is pres- 
ent on the altar ; and who affirm that the church of Christ 
is with them, though destitute of lands and possessions.' 
That the sect is more ancient than Waldo, is proved by 
Harenberg in Otiis sacris ohserv. 10, from Bernard de 
Clairvaux ; but it cannot with certainty be affirmed, how 
great that antiquity is. Some writers, quoted by Usher, 
refer them to the times of Berengarius, others, asLeger 
1. i, c. ii, to Claude of Turin, Avho under Louis the pious, 
opposed himself to images, and the dominion of the 
popes. To these times belong also some pious medita- 
tions on particular psalms, breathing a spirit of purity 
and sound doctrine, and agreeing with the state of a 
separated church. These appear in Biblioth. Bremen. 
1. ii. From that time, it is asserted that persons of this 
description resided, and were concealed, in the Rhetian 
and Cottian Alps, and jn the vallies of those mountains, 
who were thence called Waldenses, as I have mentioned 
above.^ 

* [ Venema, like several other writers, has sometimes confound- 
ed tlie Waldenses with the heretical sects which arose previously, 
and has thus attributed to them too great an antiquitj'. The best 
ecclesiastical historians amqng the Protestants have shown that the 
Waldenses took their name from Peter Waldo, and that of course 
they did not exist before his time, though there had long been 



280 APPENDIX. 

The progress of this sect was rapid and extensive, 
since Reinier testifies, that in his time there was no 
country free from them. He gives (c. 3,) the following 
causes of their increase. 1. Vain glory, they -yvishing 
to be honored like the catholic doctors. 2. Their great 
zeal, since all of them, men and women, by night and 
by day, never cease from teaching and learning. He 
adds what I would wish to be particularly noticed, that, 
amongst their first instructions, they taught their disci- 
ples to shun slanders and oaths. 3. Because they trans- 
lated the old and new testament into the vulgar tongues, 
and spake and taught according to them. He adds, ' I 
have heard and seen a certain unlearned rustic, who 
recited the book of Job, word by word, and many who 
perfectly knew the New Testament.' 4. Because they 
communicated their instruction in secret places and 
times, nor permitted any to be present except believers. 
5. The scandal arising from the bad example of certain 
catholics. 6. The insufficient teaching of others, who 
preach sometimes frivolously and sometimes falsely. 
' Hence, whatever a doctor of the church teaches,' says 
he,' which he does not prove from the New Testament, 
they consider it as entirely fabulous, contrary to the au- 
thority of the church.' 7. The want of reverence with 
which certain ministers perform the sacraments. 8. The 
hatred which they have against the church. ' I have 
heard,' he proceeds, 'from the mouth of the heretics, 
that they intended to reduce the clergy and the monks 
to the state of labourers, by taking away their tithes and 
possessions.' He afterwards adds, that in all the cities 
of Lombardy, and in Provence, and in other kingdoms 
and nations, there were more schools of heretics than of 
theologians, and more auditors. They disputed public- 
ly, and summoned the people to those solemn disputa- 
tions ; besides preaching in the markets, the fields, and 
the houses, &c. ' I was frequently present,' he adds, 

some Catholics in the valHes of Piedmont, who held many of their 
opinions. The Waldensian Confessions and other writings which 
are referred to an earlier period, prove to have been either forged 
or antedated. The reader will find some light on these points in 
Dr. Mtirdock's late edition of Mosheim, particularly in vol. ii, 
pp. 313 — 315. Note by American Editor^ 



APPENDIX. 281 

' at the inquisition and examination of the heretics; and 
their schools are reckoned in the diocese of Pavia to 
amount to forty-one.' He reckons up also the churches 
belonging to the heretics. Having enumerated the errors 
of the Albigensian Manicheans, the author of the great 
Belgian chronicle from Csesarius, A.D. 1208, thus pro- 
ceeds. 'The error of the Albigenses prevailed to that 
degree, that it had infested as much as a thousand cities, 
and if it had not been repressed by the swords of the 
faithful, I think that it would have corrupted the whole 
of Europe.' It happened indeed that when the Walden- 
ses were persecuted and' banished by the archbishop of 
Lyons, and Waldo and his companions fled to other re- 
gions, from that time they were scattered through Gaul, 
Italy, Germany, England, and Spain. Some fixed them- 
selves in Narbonne Gaul, which contains the provinces 
of Provence, Dauphiny, and Savoy: others fled to the 
Alps and settled colonies in Piedmont and Lombardy.* 
Peter Valdo, having left his country, came to Belgium, 
and in Picardy, as it is now called, obtained many fol- 
lowers ; he afterwards passed into Germany, and having 
long journeyed through the cities of the Vandals, at last 
settled in Bohemia. This is confirmed by Dubravius in 
his history of Bohemia, who relates that he arrived there 
about 1184. The Waldenses themselves, in a confer- 
ence with the Bohemians, declared that they had been 
dispersed through Lombardy, Calabria, Germany, Bohe- 
mia, and other regions, ever since the year 1160. To 
this belongs a report that about that time tAvo devils en- 
tered Bohemia in human form, teaching believers to go 
naked and sin with impunity, whence arose, in the 15th 
century, the calumny of the nakedness of the Picards.f 
The author of the Catalogus Testium Veintatis, lib. xv, 
declares that he was in possession of the consultations of 
the civilians of Avignon, of the archbishops of Narbonne, 
of Aries, and of Aix; together with the order of the 
bishop of Alby for the extirpation of the Waldenses, 

*See Usher, in loc. cit. and also Thuanns. 

+ See Beausobre, De Adamitls, at the end of L'Enfant's History 
of the Hussite War; where he demonstrates that the Waldenses 
had penetrated4nto Bohemia in that century. 



282 APPENDrx. 

written 340 years before. At the conclusion of these 
consultations, it is said, ' that it was known to every 
one that the condemnation of the Waldensian heretics, 
many years since, was as just as it was public and cele- 
brated.' 

The Albigenses were so called from the provence of 
Albi and Toulouse, where they principally inhabited. 
Albia or Albiga, now Albi, a city in the country of Ca- 
hors, belonging to Toulouse, formerly joined to the 
greater Aquitaine, a principal part of Narbonne Gaul, 
at that time bore the name of Albigesii, whence the 
Gallic heretics were called by the general name of Albi- 
genses. They were dispersed through all that tract of 
Narbonne Gaul, and through the dioceses of Albi, 
Quercy, Sens, Rhodez, and the neighbourhood. But 
the learned are not agreed as to what sect or description 
they were i)f. The Roman catholic writers, not the re- 
cent only, but also the ancient, those of the 13th cen- 
tury, (as Peter de Vaux-Cernai, a Cistertian monk, in 
a history of the Albigenses dedicated to Innocent III ; 
Csssar of Heistirbach, in a dialogue concerning miracles ; 
and the Acts of the inquisition at Toulouse, by Lim- 
borch.) paint these men in the blackest colours, as not 
only Manicheans but of the worst lives and manners. 
They relate for example that they held as to doctrine 
' that there were two Gods and Lords, one good, the 
father of Christ, the author of invisible and incorruptible 
things, the other malignant, the author of what is visible 
and corporeal, the one the author of the Old Testa- 
ment, the other of the New, so that the former was to be 
rejected except a few things which were transferred to 
the New. 2. That Christ took flesh, not really but only 
in appearance, so that he was not born of a woman, and 
that Mary, our Lord's mother, was no other than his 
church, which obeys the commandments of the father. 
3. That there was no resurrection of the body, but that 
the bodies would be spiritual. 4. That human souls 
were spirits, who fell from heaven on account of their 
sins. 

As to what belongs to their rites and institutes, 1. 
They, not only in common with the Waldenses rejected 
the sacraments of the church of Rome, and all other ec- 



APPENDIX. 283 

clesiastical rites, but also baptism and tbe eucharist, hav- 
ing only retained the imposition of hands. They also 
called the cross, the detestable sign of the devil. 2. 
They rejected the orders of the Roman church, denying 
to them, as sinners, all power of binding and loosing. 
3. They were distinguished into two kiilds ; one of 
which was called the perfect or comforted, who profess- 
ed openly their faith and religion, amongst whom they 
had what they denominated magistrates, deacons, and 
bishops. The perfect were specially named goo<i men.* 
Others, indeed, made a compact with these, which they 
termed la convenensa, a convention, that they wished to 
be received at the end of life into their sect. Their re- 
ception, called h/sreiicatio, Avas conducted in this man- 
ner : the perfect held the hands of him who was to be 
received, between his own, and over him a certain book, 
from which he read the Gospel of John, 'In the begin- 
ning was the word,' as far as, ' grace and truth came by 
Jesus Christ't He handed to" him, besides, a slender 
band, with which he was to be girded as a heretic. 
There was some difference respecting the reception of 
women, but of small moment. This reception however, 
for which they were prepared by certain abstinences, 
was thought to confer salvation, and therefore was called 
consolation, and even spiritual baptism ; and was gener- 
ally deferred to the close of life, and was conferred on 
the sick, to whom, that they might not return to healthy 
it was prescribed to put themselves into endura or absti- 
nence, in order to accelerate their death, for which pur- 
pose bathing and blood-letting were also used. They 
who refused this oppressive law, still abstained from all 
intercourse with men, and even with their Avives, lest 
they should relapse. 4. They rejected matrimony as 
sensual and unlawful, substituting in its stead a spiritual 
union. 5. I omit the licentiousness and vices of every 
kind with which they were charged. 



* Concerning these, see CI. Joeclier, Professor at Leipsic, in 
his Progr. De Bonis Hominibus, at the end of Schmidii Hist. 
Eccles. p. 3. 

t See also respecting this rite, Ermengardus contra Vallenses, 
c. xiv. 



284 APPENDIX. 

If these are their true colours, and this their true de- 
scription, they must have approached near to the Mani- 
cheains ; and the writers of the 13th century do certainly 
make a wide distinction between them and the Walden- 
ses. Peter, the monk of Vaux-Cernai, lately cited, says, 
expressly, that they diftered widely from the Waldenses, 
who were not so bad, since in many things they agreed 
with the Roman church, and differed from it only in a 
few; and of whom he thus speaks : ' To omit many ar- 
ticles of their unbelief, their error consisted principally 
in four — the wearing- of sandals, in imitation of the 
apostles — the rejection of swearing, and capital punish- 
ments, on any occasion — but chiefly in asserting, that 
any of their body might, if they wore sandals, though 
they had not received episcopal ordination, make the 
body of Christ.' Reinier, also, and the inquisition of 
Toulouse, distinguish between the Albigenses and the 
Waldenses. Bossuet also follows their footsteps in his 
History of Variations &c. 1. ii. remarking that the Wal- 
denses agreed with the catholics in the principal points, 
and were therefore only schismatics. But what have the 
Protestants to do with this ? Because the opinion has 
been generally spread that the Albigenses and Walden- 
ses were the same, and that the charges of Manicheism, 
Arianism, &c. which have been made against them are 
pure calumnies. Leger, in his history of the Walden- 
ses, I. i. c. 19, has endeavoured to free them from this 
imputation, and though his testimonies more particularly 
apply to the Waldenses, yet he has shown tbat many of 
the Albigenses were the same. See also the author of 
the book entitled La Condemnation de Bahitone, against 
Bossuet, where he treats of the Waldenses and of their 
antiquity, and vindicates the purity both of them and the 
Albigenses in faith and manners. But from this decision 
Limborch dissents, arguing that the Albigenses cannot be 
acquitted of Manicheism. Others take a middle course, 
as Spanheim, and Basnage in his ecclesiastical history, 
and more at large in the history of the reformed churches, 
in which he has inserted copious extracts from the acts 
of the inquisition at Toulouse. Both these writers allow 
that there were Manicheans and Arians amongst the 
Albigenses, who had come from the east into these and 



APPENDIX. 285 

Other western countries ; but they maintain that much 
the greater number of them were pure, though confound- 
ed by the Roman writers. 

I should not however attempt to deny, that there were 
Manicheans spread through these regions in considerable 
numbers, and that they were marked by the name of 
Albigenses, concerning which see Usher and Limborch 
in the places before cited. I also admit that in this and 
the following century, the Albigenses and Waldenses 
were currently so distinguished, as that the former were 
considered to have, if not the grosser, yet a more subtle 
form of Maniche: .n, so far at least as to speak of the 
devil as another God of this world ; they also esteemed 
the flesh as the seat of sin, so as to abstain from all com- 
merce with it, as I have before shewn, and as Limborch 
proves. But I have not the least doubt that those who 
were truly Waldenses were also called Albigenses ; for 
example, Peter de Vaux-Cernai says, ' that all the here- 
tics of Narbonne Gaul were called Albigenses, and the 
least guilty amongst these were the Waldenses.' Wil- 
liam de Podio Laurentii, in the chronicles of the Albi- 
genses, distinguishes them as Arians, Manicheans, and 
Waldenses ; which Benedict proves in his history of the 
Albigenses, from an epistle of the king of Aragon. 
Bertrand also, a lawyer of Toulouse, in his book de Ges- 
tis Toloscmorum, clears from Manicheism the count of 
Toulouse, the patron of the Albigenses.* Finally, since 
the Albigenses, both of the pure, and those of a Mani- 
chean faith, had this in common, that they ardently op- 
posed the external rights of the church, the dominion of 
the church, and the papal see, it could scarcely be other- 
wise, but that they should all be included as Manicheans 
without distinction, in order to afford a better pretext 
for persecution, and that they might be exposed to 
universal odium; as history indeed has exhibited to 
the eyes of all ages, our own not excepted, that it was 
against such heretics alone that these deeds were perpe- 
trated. 

These heretics were condemned at a council held at 



* See Ujsher, De Success. Eccles. &c. c. x, also Basnage, in 
loc. cit. 



286 APPENDIX. 

Lombez in Gascony under the bishop of Toulouse in 1175, 
by the name of Good Men, to whom the following- errors 
are imputed. 1. That the Old Testament was of no 
authority. 2. That a confession), of faith was not neces- 
sary. 3. That infants are not saved by baptism. 4. That 
the eucharist may be consecrated by Laymen. 5. 
That matrimony was unlawful and not consistent with 
salvation. 6. That the priests have not alone received 
the power of binding and loosing. But at the same time 
there is extant, inserted in the acts, a confession of their 
faith directly opposed to these errors.^ to which they add 
that they are ready to acknowledgg whatever can be 
shewn to them from the Gospels and the ivritings of the 
apostles, to their conviction ; but they refused to take 
any oath as it was forbidden by both. See Hoveden, 
Annal. p. 2, who improperly stigmatizes them as Arians. 
At this council they were condemned and expelled. 
The same was done in a synod at Toulouse, 1178, under 
the presidency of a legate of the holy see, as the same 
Hoveden testifies. They were also proscribed by the 
third council of Lateran in 1179, as we have related in 
the history of Alexander III, which sentence was con- 
firmed by Lucius III, as related by Bernard Abbot of 
Clair-Vaux in the preface to a treatise against this here- 
sy, who adds that they were summoned by Bernard to a 
disputation at Narbonne, after which Ihey were cott« 
demned. 



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